Longitudinal analysis of a very short measure of positive youth development.

As developmental scientists cease to perceive adolescence as a period of inevitable turmoil and adopt the Positive Youth Development (PYD) perspective, psychometrically sound measurement tools will be needed to assess adolescents' positive attributes. In this article we examine the longitudinal stability of the very short version of the PYD scale developed as part of the 4-H Study of PYD. Using a sample of 7,071 adolescents (60% female) followed between Grades 5 and 12, our results suggest general stability of PYD across adolescence, both in terms of mean levels and rank-order stability. We also show that both a global measure of PYD and the individual Five Cs of PYD consistently correlate with important criterion measures (i.e., contribution, depressive symptoms, and problem behaviors) in expected ways. Although our results suggest weak relationships among our three criteria, we especially note that across adolescence PYD becomes more strongly correlated with contribution but less strongly correlated with depressive symptoms, and that confidence becomes more strongly related to depressive symptoms. We discuss implications for use of the present PYD measure in youth development programs.

Activity involvement as an ecological asset: profiles of participation and youth outcomes.

Prior research has demonstrated that participation in out-of-school time activities is associated with positive and healthy development among adolescents. However, fewer studies have examined how trajectories of participation across multiple activities can impact developmental outcomes. Using data from Wave 3 (approximately Grade 7) through Wave 8 (approximately Grade 12) of the 4-H Study of Positive Youth Development, this study examined patterns of breadth in out-of-school time participation in activities and associated outcomes in positive youth development (PYD), Contribution to self and community, risk behaviors, and depressive symptoms. We assessed 927 students (on average across waves, 65.4% female) from a relatively racially and ethnically homogeneous sample (about 74% European American, across waves) with a mean age in Wave 3 of 12.98 years (SD = 0.52). The results indicated that high likelihood of participation in activities was consistently associated with fewer negative outcomes and higher scores on PYD and Contribution, as compared to low likelihood of participation in activities. Changes in the breadth of participation (in particular, moving from a high to a low likelihood of participation) were associated with increased substance use, depressive symptoms, and risk behaviors. Limitations of the current study, implications for future research, and applications to youth programs are discussed.

Youth development program participation and intentional self-regulation skills: contextual and individual bases of pathways to positive youth development.

The present research used data from Grades 8, 9, and 10 of the 4-H Study of Positive Youth Development, a longitudinal study involving U.S. adolescents, in order to better elucidate the process through which the strengths of youth and the ecological resources promoting healthy development (such as out-of-school-time programs) may contribute to thriving. We examined the relationship between adolescents' self-regulation skills (selection, optimization, and compensation) and their participation in youth development (YD) programs across Grades 8 and 9 in predicting Grade 10 PYD and Contribution. Results indicated that while self-regulation skills alone predicted PYD, self regulation and YD program participation both predicted Contribution. In addition, Grade 8 YD participation positively predicted Grade 9 self regulation, which, in turn, predicted Grade 10 PYD and Contribution. We discuss how the alignment of youth strengths and resources within the environment may promote positive youth development.

Measuring Human-Animal Attachment in a Large U.S. Survey: Two Brief Measures for Children and Their Primary Caregivers.

Researchers in the human-animal interaction (HAI) field face a challenge in generalizing the impact of pet ownership and companion animal interaction from small samples to larger populations. While researchers in Europe and Australia have included measures of pet ownership and attachment in surveys for some time (e.g., the Avon Longitudinal Study of Parents and Children), survey researchers in the United States have been slow to incorporate questions related to HAI in population representative studies. One reason for this may be that many of the current HAI-related measures involve long, complex scales. From the survey administration perspective, using complex scales is costly in terms of both time and money. The development and validation of brief measures of HAI will facilitate the inclusion of these measures in larger surveys. This paper describes the psychometric properties of two brief attachment measures used in the first population-representative study of child development in the United States that includes HAI items, the 2014 Panel Study of Income Dynamics (PSID) Child Development Supplement (CDS). We use two measures derived from the 29 item CENSHARE Pet Attachment Survey, one for children aged 8-17 (6-items) and one for the primary caregiver (3 items). The results suggest that such brief measures of attachment to pets are psychometrically valid and are a practical method of measuring HAI attachment in larger surveys using only a few survey items. We encourage HAI researchers to work with other ongoing surveys to incorporate these and comparable HAI measures.

Assessment of canine health and preventative care outcomes of a community medicine program.

The objective of this study was to assess if use of a community based veterinary medical program (the Tufts at Tech Community Veterinary Clinic) was related to indicators of canine health and well-being in a low-income community through the provision of low-cost preventative care. Participants were 177 low-income dog owners; 63 were repeat wellness/preventative care clients of the Tufts at Tech clinic, 46 were new or urgent care clients of the Tufts at Tech clinic, and 68 were a comparison sample of owners who had not used the clinic but did attend an outreach clinic in a community setting. Participants were asked to complete a survey that assessed owner demographic information, indicators of canine health and quality of life, pet attachment, and barriers that limit access to veterinary care. Results indicated that clients of the Tufts at Tech clinic were more likely to be White/Caucasian and female. In addition, there were significant positive differences on several indicators of canine health and preventative care for the Tufts at Tech wellness clients including monthly heartworm use (p < .001), use of veterinary services for both wellness (p < .001) and illness/injury (p = .001), and vaccination status (p = .003). There were no significant differences in spay/neuter status (p = .48), use of flea/tick preventative (p = .17), use of obedience training (p = .75), problem behaviors (p = .05), canine quality of health (p = .74) or attachment (p = .63). The Tufts at Tech clients reported lower rates of several barriers to accessing care, including cost. These findings provide important information regarding who is using low-cost clinics such as the Tufts at Tech model, the potential benefits of repeated preventative care on dog health, and suggestions for reducing barriers to accessing veterinary services.

Survey of human-horse relationships and veterinary care for geriatric horses.

OBJECTIVE To assess relationships between horse owners (or lessees) and geriatric or nongeriatric horses and to investigate factors influencing veterinary care decision-making. DESIGN Descriptive, cross-sectional, survey-based study. SAMPLE 2,879 people who owned or leased ≥ 1 horse. PROCEDURES Participants were recruited through social media and online horse forums to participate in an online survey about their horses, including measures of attachment, veterinary care decision-making, and experiences surrounding the death of a horse. Data were collected for primary horses (those respondents interacted with most) and secondary horses. Horses were further categorized as geriatric (≥ 20 years of age) and nongeriatric. RESULTS Geriatric primary horses were considered companion animals, retired, or used as part of a business significantly more frequently, and described as competition horses significantly less frequently, than nongeriatric horses. Geriatric horses were owned or leased significantly longer than nongeriatric horses, but the degree of respondents' attachment did not differ for geriatric versus nongeriatric horses. When respondents reported the death of a horse in the previous year, euthanasia was associated with higher levels of bereavement than death by other means. Death of geriatric horses most commonly followed a chronic illness and was associated with significantly higher levels of bereavement than death of nongeriatric horses. Among factors influencing decisions regarding expensive or long-term medical care, the horse's ability to lead a comfortable life was ranked highest. Respondents with geriatric horses made numerous accommodations for their care. CONCLUSIONS AND CLINICAL RELEVANCE Results provided important initial information about the relationships people have with geriatric horses. Understanding how individuals perceive their horses and how they make decisions regarding complex veterinary care is critical in informing effective client communication.

A Systematic Review of the Literature Addressing Veterinary Care for Underserved Communities.

Currently, there is a care gap in veterinary medicine affecting low-income and underserved communities, resulting in decreased nonhuman-animal health and welfare. The use of low-price and community veterinary clinics in underserved populations is a strategy to improve companion-animal health through preventative care, spay/neuter, and other low-price care programs and services. Little research has documented the structure and effectiveness of such initiatives. This systematic review aimed to assess current published research pertaining to accessible health care, community-based veterinary medicine, and the use of community medicine in teaching programs. The review was an in-depth literature search identifying 51 publications relevant to the importance, benefits, drawbacks, and use of low-price and community clinics in underserved communities. These articles identified commonly discussed barriers to care that may prevent underserved clientele from seeking veterinary care. Five barriers were identified including the cost of veterinary care, accessibility of care, problems with or lack of veterinarian-client communication, culture/language, and lack of client education. The review also identified a need for additional research regarding evidence of effectiveness and efficiency in community medicine initiatives.

Emergence, self-organization and developmental science.

Our understanding is that psychology is a biopsychosocial science as well as a developmental science. Behavioral origins stem from ontogenetic processes, behavioral as well as biological. Biological factors are simply participating factors in behavioral origins and not causal factors. Psychology is not a biological science; it is a unique psychological science, a natural science consistent and compatible with the principles of the other sciences. Accordingly, we show in this chapter how principles and ideas from other sciences play important roles in psychology. While we focus on the concepts from physics of self-organization and emergence, we also address the cosmological and evolutionary biology idea of increased complexity over time, the organizing principle of integrative levels, and the epigenetic processes that are in part responsible for transgenerational trait transmission. Our discussion stresses the developmental science concepts of embodiment and contextualism and how they structure thinking about psychological processes. We conclude with a description of how these ideas support current postpositivist conceptions of relational processes and models in contemporary developmental science.

Youth activity involvement and positive youth development.

Participation in high quality out-of-school-time activities constitutes a significant portion of the time that many youth spend away from their families or school settings, and current theory and research suggests that activity participation can be an influential contextual asset for promoting adaptive outcomes for youth. Therefore, the purpose of this chapter is to highlight how the relational developmental-systems-based positive youth development perspective is a useful framework for examining how and why high quality activity participation may be associated with positive developmental outcomes. As an example of research within this framework, we present findings from the 4-H Study of Positive Youth Development in order to illustrate how activity participation is an important facet of aligning individual youth strengths with resources within the environment. Finally, we discuss how to synthesize the research that exists on activity participation, and what the current research suggests for future empirical and applied steps in the field.