Community and political involvement in adolescence: What distinguishes the activists from the uninvolved?

Warm and Supportive Parenting Can Discourage Offspring’s Civic Engagement in the Transition to Adulthood

“…Influential theories of civic development (Flanagan 2003;Lerner et al 2003 suggest that such qualities of parenting should foster civic engagement, especially community service and volunteering, as they foster all kinds of prosocial behaviors (Chase-Lansdale et al 1995;Gagné 2003). Whereas many North American studies of adolescents found supporting evidence for this idea (Mahatmya & Lohman 2012;Fletcher et al 2000;Lewin-Bizan et al 2010;Pancer et al 2007), other research yielded nonsignificant, mixed, or negative effects of warm and supportive parenting on civic engagement (Alesina & Giuliano 2011;Kanacri et al 2014;Marzana et al 2012;Omoto & Snyder 1995;Schmid Callina et al 2014). Our objective in the present study was to investigate under which circumstances the effects of parenting on civic engagement might be negative (see Figure 1).…”

“…Although developmental literature has addressed parental influences (e.g., political discussion at home) on the development of critical consciousness (i.e., critical awareness of social inequalities and injustice and action to bring about social change), especially in marginalized youth (Diemer & Li 2011), the role of broader characteristics of parenting in the development of political activism has received less attention. Regarding volunteering, both positive (Mahatmya & Lohman 2012;Fletcher et al 2000;Gagné 2003;Pancer et al 2007) and negative (Omoto & Snyder 1995; effects of supportive family have been found. However, one study reported that a high perceived family support predicted stronger future intentions for volunteering but not for political engagement in young adults from the former East Germany.…”

“…We chose Finland as a study setting because social democratic regimes (i.e., Finland and other Nordic countries) differ in important ways from both North American countries, where most of prior findings on the positive link between supportive parenting and civic engagement originate (e.g., Mahatmya & Lohman 2012;Fletcher et al 2000;Gagné 2003;Lewin-Bizan et al 2010;Pancer et al 2007;Schmid Callina et al 2014), and South and East European countries, where nonsignificant or even negative associations between supportive family relationships and civic engagement were sometimes found (Alesina & Giuliano 2011;Kanacri et al 2014;Marzana et al 2012;. Similarly to the non-Hispanic White populations of the US and Canada, Finland boasts high rates of civic engagement, also among young people (around 70% of university students volunteer; Haski-Leventhal et al 2010).…”

“…Supporting empirical evidence for the broader influence of positive parenting comes from many North American studies that found warm, supportive, or authoritative parenting reported by adolescents or their parents or observed during family interactions to predict young people's social trust (Wray-Lake & Flanagan 2012), concern for future generations (Lawford, Pratt, Hunsberger, & Pancer 2005), and civic engagement (Mahatmya & Lohman 2012;Fletcher et al 2000;Gagné 2003;Pancer, Pratt, Hunsberger, & Alisat 2007), also via fostering their positive individual attributes (Lewin-Bizan et al 2010;Schmid Callina et al 2014) and psychological need satisfaction (Gagné 2003). These effects were found both in non-Hispanic White and in ethnically diverse samples and held for an impressive range of civic outcomes, including volunteering and community service, blood donations, voting, conventional political participation, and social action.…”

Fostering Student Activism: Barriers, Sharing, and Dialectics

“…Further, developing knowledge about social issues and enhancing activist skills inspired students' continued engagement in activism (Curry-Stevens et al, 2008;Pancer et al, 2007).Researchers discovered that prior involvement in activism forged greater empowerment (Van Dyke & Dixson, 2013), subjective vitality (Klar & Klasser, 2009), and motivation to continue to participate in activism (Pancer et al, 2007).…”