Robust evidence links students' positive mental health with academic achievement and provides a compelling rationale for developing and refining strength-based assessments. The Social Emotional Health Survey--Secondary (SEHS-S) assesses adolescents' social and emotional skills and positive psychological dispositions. Previous studies provide…

Background: Borderline personality symptoms include emotional dysregulation, high levels of impulsivity leading to self-harm and suicidality, an unstable sense of self, fears of abandonment, extremely turbulent relationships, and psychic pain. They are considered to disrupt normative adolescent development however their unique contribution to…

Socioeconomic gaps in academic achievement have been widely documented. However, whether and to what extent these socioeconomic gaps extend to the domain of socio-emotional skills is still relatively underexplored. Furthermore, limited research has examined the potential mechanisms that might help explain this relationship. To address these gaps,…

Despite increasing attention to understanding strengths in those on the autism spectrum, few studies have explored this in older individuals. The present study provides a qualitative analysis of parent-reported strengths and positive qualities of 68 15-30-year-olds with autism and/or intellectual disability (ID). Most parents (97%) reported at…

Communicative ability is embodied as "extroversion" in the Big Five Personality Test. Typically, extroversion includes boldness, self-confidence, liveliness, enthusiasm, optimism, and being. The OECD designed a communication competence evaluation framework based on "extroversion" in the "Big Five Personality" model…

The purpose of this study is to reveal the factors influential on adolescents' social competence within the frame of a model. Based on this purpose, the study was carried out in two phases. Initially, data were collected from 283 high school students for the validity and reliability studies of Positive-Negative Perfectionism Scale adolescent form.…

This study explores the educational implications of autism spectrum traits as assessed by the Deenz Autism Spectrum Profile Assessment Scale (DASPAS-42). The scale evaluates 14 dimensions: socialization, communication, sensory processing, flexibility, routine adherence, repetition, emotional sensitivity, anxiety, empathy, motor skills, attention,…

Although a considerable body of research has documented the association between victimization experience and adolescent mental health, previous studies have not investigated the mediating effects of personality characteristics such as social competence and self-mastery on the associations between cyberbullying victimization and mental health. This…

In the fall of 2019, 3,117 15-year-old students in the Houston Independent School District (HISD) participated in the Study on Social and Emotional Skills (SSES), part of an international effort led by the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), with Houston serving as the only U.S. site. This report provides a snapshot of…

Purpose: Today's education system focuses primarily on the academic skills of individuals. However, art and music education is thought to affect both humor and interpersonal problem-solving skills by supporting the social and emotional skills of adolescents. Therefore, this study was designed to investigate how receiving art and music education…

This systematic review assesses the state of the literature regarding the impacts of outdoor education instructors' behaviors and traits on participant outcomes. Twenty-seven articles are reviewed in detail, and student outcomes in relation to instructor behaviors and traits and to programmatic elements are identified. A range of participant…

The present study examines language impact on anxiety in at-risk children deprived of parental care. Bulgarian children without parents (n=40) divided into 3 age groups (aged 7-10; aged 11-14; and aged 15-17) embed intervention accomplished by four volunteers using four interaction strategies: normal voice and positive language; high tone and…

Recent publications in the "Journal of Youth and Adolescence" present a variety of topics exploring adolescents' mental functioning in the twenty first century. Conceptually, many of the articles address the intriguing, though rarely explicit, question of developmental continuities and change from adolescence to adulthood. Such…

We investigated the degree to which parent positive personality characteristics in terms of conscientiousness, agreeableness, and emotional stability predict similar adolescent personality traits over time, as well as the role played by positive parenting in this process. Mothers and fathers of 451 White adolescents (52% female, mean age = 13.59…

The VIA Classification of Strengths and Virtues attempts to provide a comprehensive model of character based on 24 character strengths. The present study is the largest study to date exploring the structure of the 24 strengths in youth. One sample (N = 23,850) completed the VIA-Youth, a teen measure of the VIA Classification. Based on a random…