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Engagement and Mentor Support as Drivers of Social Development in the Project K Youth Development Program

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Abstract

Youth development programs can achieve positive social outcomes, however studies comparing the influence of different program components are rare. Structural equation modeling of longitudinal, multilevel data (N = 327) from Project K, a multi-component youth development program, assessed how experiences of engagement or support in each component affected social outcomes. Participants reported significant gains in social self-efficacy and sense of community after the program. Engagement in the outdoor adventure and support during the mentoring partnership components significantly contributed to observed social gains, while engagement in the community service component did not. Results confirm youth development programs can positively influence adolescent social development, while highlighting the importance of moving beyond “black box” investigations in order to maximize program impact and efficiency.

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Notes

  1. No difference in gender representation was found between participants excluded due to missing data (n = 38) and those retained (n = 327). Comparing participants identifying as Māori, Pacific, or European ethnicity, chi square analyses revealed that European youth were more likely, χ 2 (1) = 17.20, p < .001, while Pacific youth were less likely to be retained, χ 2 (1) = 15.59, p < .001. Due to low response frequencies (<5 for excluded data) it was not possible to compare Asian, other, or combined ethnicities. Finally, independent t-tests with a Bonferroni correction were employed to assess baseline social resources between groups. Those excluded due to missing data reported significantly higher levels of social self-efficacy at baseline (M = 4.15, SD = 0.91) than those retained in the analyses (M = 3.84, SD = 0.89), p = .01. The implications of these systematic group differences are addressed in the discussion.

  2. Sample sizes for gender allowed for a robust assessment of the difference in program effects across groups (144 females to 183 males; both n > 100). Other groupings were not balanced and consisted of smaller sample sizes (for example, only the sample of European ethnicity had n > 100) or contained too small a range to make comparisons meaningful (e.g., age). Therefore, in accordance with conventions of invariance testing (Thompson and Green 2006), other group comparisons were not carried out.

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Acknowledgements

The authors gratefully acknowledge the Graeme Dingle Foundation and their Community Partners for their part in implementing the evaluation and supporting the research. We also thank two anonymous reviewers for their helpful comments on an earlier draft of this article. The authors received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Authors’ Contributions

K. D. designed the original study with support from J. M. and under the supervision of N. H., and all authors contributed to aspects of the research design for this article. J. M. coordinated and managed the data collection. M. C. led the statistical analyses and drafted the methods and results with K. D., while C. C., K. D. and N. H. all contributed to the interpretation of results. C. C. took primary responsibility for writing the full article with support from K. D. and N. H. All authors reviewed and approved the final version.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. School of Psychology, The University of Queensland, Brisbane, QLD 4072, Australia

    Cassandra M. Chapman

  2. Faculty of Education and Social Work, The University of Auckland, Private Bag 92601, Auckland 1150, New Zealand

    Kelsey L. Deane

  3. School of Psychology, The University of Auckland, Private Bag 92019, Auckland 1142, New Zealand

    Niki Harré

  4. Graduate School of Education, The University of Melbourne, 100 Leicester St, Melbourne, VIC 3053, Australia

    Matthew G. R. Courtney

  5. Graeme Dingle Foundation, PO Box 305 474, Triton Plaza, North Shore 0757, New Zealand

    Julie Moore

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Correspondence to Cassandra M. Chapman.

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Conflicts of Interest

J. M. is the Research and Evaluation Manager for the Graeme Dingle Foundation, the organization that owns the Project K program. She was involved in the study design and data collection; however, she had no involvement in the data analysis or reporting of the findings. C. C., K. D., N. H. and M. C. declare that they have no competing interests.

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All procedures performed in studies involving human participants were in accordance with the ethical standards of the institutional research committee and/or national research committee and with the 1964 Helsinki declaration and its later amendments or comparable ethical standards.

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Informed consent was obtained from all individual participants included in the study.

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Chapman, C.M., Deane, K.L., Harré, N. et al. Engagement and Mentor Support as Drivers of Social Development in the Project K Youth Development Program. J Youth Adolescence 46, 644–655 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10964-017-0640-5

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