The learning contract is the ideal way to enable the teacher to raise levels of expectation, to provide individual attention, and to personalize the educational experience. Includes a sample contract and suggested practices for the use of a learning contract. (15 references) (MLF)

Notes that parents need to be supported, valued, and educated to contribute to healthy sexual development of their children. Presents rationale for counselors to guide parents as primary sex educators for their children through collaboration with counselors, administrators, and parents. (Author/NB)

Currently, theoretical approaches to studying minority adolescence involve implicit links among ethnicity and pathology, cultural difference, and cultural deviance. This paper discusses theoretical approaches for exploring the interactive relationship among ethnicity, identity, and competence for minority youth to reconceptualize their…

In one study, a comparison of 42 high school juniors with 42 delinquent adolescents showed that delinquents have less successful task resolutions. In a second study of 175 seventh graders, twelfth graders, and college freshmen, juniors, and seniors, older students and those with low dysfunctional attitudes had better task resolutions. (SLD)

Studied the extent to which psychosocial development thorough the first 5 stages of E. H. Erikson's theory of personality development is associated with personality disorder symptoms, using 106 undergraduates. Negative resolutions of stages one through five may predict the presence of personality disorder symptomatology during late adolescence.…

Used the experience sampling method to examine emotional structure of the week for adolescents in fifth to eighth grades and again four years later. Found that weekend evenings emerged in middle adolescence as the week's emotional high point, a time for enjoyable peer group and romantic activities, although the scripts for Friday and Saturday…

Discusses how mobility, education, family adjustment, social relationships, and emotional adjustment to adolescence influence health adjustment. Social-work implications suggest a holistic approach emphasizing the concepts of youth and family empowerment and quality of life as the key professional endeavors in practice with youths with…

This study investigated the relationship between advanced-grade placement and the self-concept of 600 gifted adolescents. No differences were found in any facet of self-concept between grade-advanced and non-advanced students nor in interactions of advanced status and gender and/or grade level. Caucasian students were significantly more likely to…

Used a goodness-of-fit model and an exploration-based/perspective-taking model to examine identity formation among Jewish adolescents. Found that ideological identity diffusion was higher among students living in Jewish nondominant neighborhoods, and ethnic behaviors and practices and total ethnic identity were higher among adolescents living in…

Reports findings on changes in adolescent-crowd orientations using national data from the National Education Longitudinal Study of 1988. Categorizes high school students into five prototypical peer-crowd orientations at tenth and twelfth grade. Illuminates the change in students' peer crowd orientation by examining individual and relationship…

Examined orientation of high school students' peer groups to formal (school-oriented) and informal (peer-oriented) reward systems. Investigated factors that influence change in peer-group orientation over time, and demonstrated how changes by the individual and changes in peer-group orientation predicted change in ego identity. Demonstrated how…

The reliability and validity of the trait form of the Multiple Affect Adjective Check List-Revised (MAACL-R6) have been demonstrated for sixth- and seventh-grade public school students and patients at a mental health clinic. In this study, norms for the MAACL-R6 with middle and high school students are investigated. (Author)

Examines the perception of urban African-American adolescent mothers and fathers regarding sex, love, intimacy, pregnancy, and parenting. Uses structured interviews and focus groups to gather data. Employs inductive data analysis using constant comparison methods to identify themes and patterns within and across gender groups. (Author/GCP)

Surveyed junior and senior high students. Found that adolescents' identity exploration and commitment reflect institutional transitions: those facing transition to senior high exhibited more exploration and commitment related to future education and occupation than younger students. Concerns with a future family increased with age and were…

Compares relationships in adoptive and non-adoptive families (N=253) containing late-adolescents and examines family member roles in preventing adolescents' psychosocial risk. Results suggest a different relational configuration between family types. The father/child relationship and the mother/child relationship play different roles in preventing…