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Crossing the Age Divide: Cross-Age Collaboration Between Programs Serving Transition-Age Youth

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Abstract

Programs that serve transition-age youth with serious mental health conditions typically reside in either the child or the adult system. Good service provision calls for interactions among these programs. The objective of this research was to discover programmatic characteristics that facilitate or impede collaboration with programs serving dissimilar age groups, among programs that serve transition-age youth. To examine this “cross-age collaboration,” this research used social network analysis methods to generate homophily and heterophily scores in three communities that had received federal grants to improve services for this population. Heterophily scores (i.e., a measure of cross-age collaboration) in programs serving only transition-age youth were significantly higher than the heterophily scores of programs that served only adults or only children. Few other program markers or malleable program factors predicted heterophily. Programs that specialize in serving transition-age youth are a good resource for gaining knowledge of how to bridge adult and child programs.

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Notes

  1. This figure is calculated from the 12% prevalence rate of serious emotional disturbance for children and adolescents1 applied to population of 15–17-year-olds and 6.5% prevalence rate of serious mental illness2 applied to the population of 18–25-year-olds from in the 2016 U.S. Census population estimate.3

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Acknowledgements

This manuscript was developed under a grant with funding from the National Institute on Disability, Independent Living, and Rehabilitation Research and the Center for Mental Health Services of the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (Grant H133B090018, to the first author, The Learning and Working During the Transition to Adulthood RRTC). We are grateful to John Coppola, Pnina Goldfarb, Bruce Kamradt, and DeDe Sieler for their help with this project and the programs and their respondents who participated in this research. The contents of this paper do not necessarily represent the policy of NIDILRR or SAMHSA and you should not assume endorsement by the Federal Government.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Transitions to Adulthood Center for Research, Systems and Psychosocial Advances Research Center, Department of Psychiatry, University of Massachusetts Medical School, 222 Maple Ave., Shrewsbury, MA, 01545, USA

    Maryann Davis PhD & Kathryn Sabella MA

  2. Regional Research Institute, School of Social Work, Portland State University, PO Box 751, Portland, OR, 97207, USA

    Nancy Koroloff PhD

  3. International Development and Social Change, Global and Community Health Program, Clark University, 950 Main Street, Worcester, MA, 01610, USA

    Marianne Sarkis PhD

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  1. Maryann Davis PhD
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  2. Nancy Koroloff PhD
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  4. Marianne Sarkis PhD
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Correspondence to Maryann Davis PhD.

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Davis, M., Koroloff, N., Sabella, K. et al. Crossing the Age Divide: Cross-Age Collaboration Between Programs Serving Transition-Age Youth. J Behav Health Serv Res 45, 356–369 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11414-018-9588-9

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