Twenty narrative interviews were conducted with German host parents between 2006 and 2007 about their experiences with a one-year stay of a guest student in their family. The study took place within the context of a student research project as part of the research-oriented MA course "Intercultural Communication-Intercultural Competence"…

Adolescence is a critical period of development. Previous research suggests parent involvement in school directly impacts student success. However, different types of parental involvement and the efforts of middle school personnel to educate parents about these effective practices have received scant attention in the literature. The level and type…

During the developmental stage of adolescence young people face many stressful challenges (Dacey & Kenny, 1997). Some adolescents manage these challenges adaptively but others do not and are therefore at the risk of adopting maladaptive responses to stress (Frydenberg & Lewis, 2002; Patton & Noller, 1990). Because adolescents are…

Daniel Offer's seminal writings in the 1960s led to a realization that normal adolescence was not characterized by turmoil and upheaval, the then prevailing view that derived from studies of clinical samples. In this paper, the research findings that have appeared over the last four decades are reviewed with respect to the overall features of…

Current parent-adolescent behavioral interaction research highlights the importance of three elements of behavior in defining adaptive interactions: autonomy, control, and warmth vs. hostility. However, this research has largely addressed the developmental needs and psychosocial outcomes of adolescents, as opposed to parents, with a focus on how…

Recent research has identified a discreet set of subjective markers that are seen as characterizing the transition to adulthood. The current study challenges this coherence by examining the disparity and variability in young people's selection of such criteria. Four sentence-completion cues corresponding to four different contexts in which adult…

Objective: This article describes the development and initial validation of the 90-item Chinese Positive Youth Development Scale (CPYDS), which contains items related to 15 aspects of positive youth development. Method: Adolescents with well adjustment ( N = 162) and poor adjustment (N = 160) responded to the CPYDS. Results: The findings showed…

In this article, the author describes the various changes that are experienced by young adolescents. Physically, early adolescents are growing faster than at any other time in their lives except infancy. They experience significant increases in weight, height, heart size, lung capacity, and muscular strength. Intellectually and cognitively, early…

In this article, the author describes how researchers study the adolescent brain--a subject of inquiry that did not exist a generation ago. Any parent of a teenager knows that adolescents often have difficulty navigating through their world. Now scientists are starting to find out why. Peering into the minds of maturing youngsters, researchers are…

Although identity researchers now believe that identity formation occurs not only by separation from others but also in relational contexts, few empirical studies of this concept have been conducted. This paper has three aims: (1) to reconceptualize identity formation to take relational aspects into account, focusing particularly on identity…

This document presents "I'm Positive: Growing Up With Self-Esteem," an informal, personal study course designed to strengthen the reader's ability to nurture self-esteem in children from birth through adolescence. Special emphasis is given to four parenting skills: acceptance, encouragement, empowerment, and love. Weekly activities are provided…

The general development of the concept of self-esteem is reviewed, and concerns about the research strategies and issues are discussed. This paper focuses on adolescent self-esteem. Research is presented on global self-esteem, domain specific self-esteem as it relates to global self-esteem, and the identification of self-esteem trajectories.…

This booklet begins with a poem written by an adolescent undergoing psychotherapy for depression, then goes on to describe what depression is and to examine sex and age differences related to depression. The difference between clinical depression and feeling blue is explained. Various therapies used in the treatment of depression are identified.…

Adolescent mothers display less frequent, accepting, and involved interaction with their children than do older mothers. Yet the role of the young mothers' psychosocial immaturity in these phenomena remains unexplained. This project explores the validity of Newberger's model of Parental Awareness (PA) which outlines hierarchical stages in the…

This annually revised bibliography lists books on subjects of special interest and appeal to teenagers. Selected by the Committee on Books for Young Adults, which is composed of librarians who work with teenagers in the New York Public Library, the approximately 1,250 titles and brief annotations are arranged under the following main headings:…