The Leadership Stories Our Youth Are Told: Characterizations of Leadership Behaviors and Orientations in Popular Youth TV Shows.

Given the consistently high viewership of television (TV) by youth, the social, behavioral, developmental, and psychological impact of such viewing has been studied for decades. Yet, little research has focused on the connections between youth, the TV shows to which they are exposed, and the characterizations of leadership presented to them. This study examines the type of leadership behaviors and orientations presented through youth TV shows in the United States across a continuum of viewership age targets. Shows were selected through purposeful sampling from the most popular youth TV shows in the United States, and episodes were chosen based on synopsis, selecting for the greatest possibility of leadership scenarios. Researchers identified three shows for each viewer target age group and five episodes for each TV show, for a total of 75 episodes. The findings include the discovery that show-prescribed viewer target age group positively predicted leadership behavior such as direction-setting-i.e., gathering information, organizing information, sense-making, and forecasting. Additionally, as viewer target age range increased, shows presented with a decrease in communal leadership-characterized as caring, warm, trustworthy, empathetic, helpful, and/or friendly. Such findings suggest that the representations of leadership depicted in popular youth TV shows are transmitting potentially counterproductive messages to future leaders, deprioritizing crucial leadership elements.

Neighborhood-Level Interventions to Improve Childhood Opportunity and Lift Children Out of Poverty.

Population health is associated with the socioeconomic characteristics of neighborhoods. There is considerable scientific and policy interest in community-level interventions to alleviate child poverty. Intergenerational poverty is associated with inequitable access to opportunities. Improving opportunity structures within neighborhoods may contribute to improved child health and development. Neighborhood-level efforts to alleviate poverty for all children require alignment of cross-sector efforts, community engagement, and multifactorial approaches that consider the role of people as well as place. We highlight several accessible tools and strategies that health practitioners can engage to improve regional and local systems that influence child opportunity. The Child Opportunity Index is a population-level surveillance tool to describe community-level resources and inequities in US metropolitan areas. The case studies reviewed outline strategies for creating higher opportunity neighborhoods for pediatricians interested in working across sectors to address the impact of neighborhood opportunity on child health and well-being.