In order to prepare students for adulthood and responsible citizenship, most high schools offer extracurricular activities designed to facilitate the learning of a wide range of competencies. The purpose of this study was to examine how participation in a single or a combination of extracurricular school activities for high school students may…

Civic knowledge is critical to interpreting various policy and candidate issues that are necessary to participating in certain political activities, such as voting in elections or attending public demonstrations. Various studies have examined students' perceptions of classroom openness, which reflects perceived levels of political discussion…

Although assigned mentoring relationships have typically involved same-gender matches, a growing number of programs, particularly those in schools, have begun pairing female mentors with male mentees. This practice stems, in large part, from the relative dearth of male mentors and programs' efforts to increase the availability of youth…

Research suggests that behavioral self-regulation skills are critical for early school success, but few studies have explored such links among young children in Europe. This study examined the contribution of early self-regulation to academic achievement gains among children in France, Germany, and Iceland. Gender differences in behavioral…

Evidence points to associations between the socioeconomic composition of neighborhoods and children's and adolescents' development. A minimal amount of research, however, examines how timing of exposure to neighborhood socioeconomic conditions matters. This study used longitudinal data from the NICHD Study of Early Child Care and Youth…

Guided by a naïve theories perspective on the development of thinking about disease, this study of 188 children aged 6 to 18 examined knowledge of HIV/AIDS causality and prevention using parallel measures derived from open-ended and structured interviews. Knowledge of both risk factors and prevention rules, as well as conceptual understanding of…

Although research has examined how parenting may influence children's social information processing, little research has examined how these factors may influence children's social goals. The current study examined how both parent- and child-reports of parenting behaviors were associated with regressed change in children's reported social goals…

Building on prior variable-oriented research which demonstrates the independence of the associations of child care quality, quantity, and type of setting with family factors and child outcomes, the current study identifies four profiles of child care dimensions from the NICHD Study of Early Child Care and Youth Development. Profiles accounted for…

Through secondary data analysis of a nationally representative sample, the study explored the relations between adolescent summer arrangements and associated developmental outcomes (well-being, externalizing behavior, body mass index, and academic performance). The study also examined if these relations were mediated by parental knowledge of youth…

It is generally assumed that civic education efforts will have a positive effect on the political attitudes and behaviors of adolescents and young adults. In the present study, we distinguish among formal civic education, an open classroom climate, and active learning strategies, and we explore their relation with political interest, efficacy,…

This article contributes new evidence on the associations among immigrant generation, gender, and sexual risk behavior among Latino adolescents in the United States. Longitudinal data from 3,272 Latino adolescents (grades 7-12) who participated in the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health (Add Health) were examined for evidence of the…

Working from a life course perspective, this study examined the links between mothers' fertility and relationship statuses and children's early school achievement and how these links varied by race/ethnicity and immigration status. Analyses of nationally representative data from the Early Childhood Longitudinal Study-Kindergarten Cohort revealed…

The present study investigated the associations of well-being with engagement in illicit drug use, sexual risk taking, and impaired driving in a sample of 9,515 students from 30 U.S. colleges and universities. Participants completed measures of subjective well-being, psychological well-being, and eudaimonic well-being, and indicated how many times…

Utilizing a developmental-ecological framework, the purpose of this study was to understand the unique impact of multiple maternal risks across time on ethnically diverse, low-income, preschool children's cognitive skills, pro-social behaviors, and behavior problems. Additionally, this study sought to understand the variability of maternal risks…

The present longitudinal study employed two distinctive approaches (variable-oriented and person-oriented) to examine low-income children's academic and social functioning across the important transition from pre-k to first grade. Participants included 152 former urban Head Start children. Variable-oriented and person-oriented approaches were…