The current study's purpose is to explore the influence of peer-perceived creativity (sociometric creativity) on the short-term development of friendships during a summer program for high ability students. Specifically, the two main objectives of our study are: (1) How did students' friendships network and sociometric creativity network evolve in…

This article describes a study that investigated whether child welfare-involved youths' school engagement affected delinquency after controlling for peer deviance, caregiver closeness, and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). This study used data from 461 11- to 17-year-olds who had substantiated child maltreatment investigations and…

Adolescent drinking represents a significant problem in the United States. Although high school juniors and seniors are particularly vulnerable to the negative consequences associated with alcohol use, evidence-based interventions for this age group are limited. The purpose of this article is to introduce a Web-based alcohol intervention with…

International students have become an important and growing group in U.S. higher education. Although many universities offer various types of support to international students, little attention is given to preventive health services or health promotion efforts, such as the promotion of physical activity. This article outlines a theory-based…

Few alcohol prevention programs focus on elementary school-aged youth, yet children develop expectancies and norms about alcohol use during the elementary school years, and many elementary school children are allowed to have sips or tastes of alcohol at home. Research on consequences of early alcohol use indicates that it can put children at…

In this paper, the authors review empirical evidence on the effects of peer groups on social, emotional and behavioural functioning. The paper shows that an understanding of the ways in which peer groups can influence the development of deviance and subvert the positive effects of interventions can be exploited in the promotion of positive social…

Within the modern institution of schooling, educators portray children as lacking in knowledge and maturity and try to restrict their access to the issues that undermine this assumed innocence. Such renditions of children produce hierarchical power relationships in which children's ways of knowing are seen as what Foucault (1980) called…

Few after-school programs target alcohol and other drug (AOD) use because it is difficult to encourage a diverse group of youth to voluntarily attend. The current study describes CHOICE, a voluntary after-school program which targeted AOD use among middle school students. Over 4,000 students across eight schools completed surveys and 15%…

Peer Resources is at the heart of positive youth development. Trained youth serving in roles such as mentor, tutor, mediator, leader, and educator can change the norms of a school and community. Utilizing people as resources is an important concept to embrace. During the last seven years, peer mentors have reduced the drop-out rate of 16- and…

The objective of the study was to develop and evaluate an effective whole-community approach to identifying a diverse group of influential young people to effectively diffuse health promotion messages among their peers. A peer nomination questionnaire, developed through extensive piloting work, was completed by 10 730 Year 8 students (aged 12-13…

Big Brothers/Big Sisters is a national program aimed at providing mentors for disadvantaged children. This study tested whether Big Sister mentors could be trained to increase communication with their Little Sisters about sexual health issues. The study tested an intervention based on social cognitive theory in which a sexual health communication…

A Brigham Young University program using students to provide individual advising and orientation assistance to entering students, an effort to reduce the problem of students accepting admission and not showing up, is described and discussed. (MSE)

Describes the national antismoking campaign in terms of various school projects funded by the U.S. Department of Health, Education, and Welfare, coordinated by its new Office on Smoking and Health. Projects include utilizing peer counselors, demonstrating what smoking does to the body, and showing how to deal with social pressures. (MF)

The current study is a formative evaluation of an integrated, school-based program for urban minority youth transitioning into high school. The design of this pilot project was quasi-experimental in nature, with one freshman physical education class assigned to receive the intervention and one to receive no program or "treatment as usual." The…

Eight physically handicapped (blind, spina bifida, cerebral palsy, or genetic defect) preschool children and eight children with normal sensory motor abilities (mean age of both groups 3 1/2 years) participated in a preschool demonstration project designed to promote equal educational and social experiences in an integrated preschool through the…