Reframing Adolescent Research

Leo B. Hendry, Marion Kloep

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2018
• ISBN:
  9781351367004
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Psychology
• Subtopic: History & Theory in Psychology
• Index: Psychology

How can we ensure that adolescent research is really assisting the optimal developmental transitions of young people, now and in the near future?

Reframing Adolescent Research suggests that what is needed is a 'paradigm-shift', a movement towards implementing more systemic, innovative and inter-disciplinary approaches to youth research, which are more suited to resolving the real issues that young people face in the twenty-first century.

Contributions from world-class academics examine theoretical concerns and methodological challenges to substantive areas in the field, considering possible limitations and weaknesses in current approaches. They argue for the need for 'unorthodox, ' systemic inter-disciplinary research which looks beyond the social sciences to consider innovations and novel approaches to the study of adolescence and development across the lifespan. New theories, methods and interventions are presented that are essential to advancing the project of understanding adolescents and how they develop on a global stage.

This ground-breaking volume will encourage debate and dialogue on the future of youth research. It is valuable reading for advanced students and researchers in adolescent development and developmental psychology.

1

‘TO BOLDLY GO!’

Reframing adolescent research

Leo B. Hendry and Marion Kloep

This opening chapter ‘sets the scene’ for the main purpose of the book, which is to encourage discussion about a ‘paradigm-shift’ in adolescent research. It does so by briefly pointing out the ways modern researchers have built upon the findings of earlier ‘pioneers’ in adolescent research, and made many research contributions to various aspects of young people’s transitions to adulthood in Western cultures. Nevertheless, weaknesses and limitations in current approaches are noted by taking examples from topics within youth research and arguing that similar ‘deficiences’ are evident within the social sciences generally. It is suggested that there is a need for a systemic, inter-disciplinary ‘paradigm-shift’ to seriously address the needs, concerns and enhancements of young people’s various transitions to adulthood in fast-changing, technological Western societies. The book’s co-authors, a blend of acknowledged, international writers and young, talented researchers, are introduced together with the titles of their individual chapters.

Introduction

We were never particular fans of Captain Kirk and the crew of the Starship Enterprise, yet over the years the phrase that the introductory voice-over intoned before each episode has stayed with us, even into approaching old age: ‘To boldly go’ to stars and galaxies where no-one else has ventured offered challenge, novelty, excitement and risk for the crew and (vicariously) for viewers. This is rather like the reasons why certain contexts and leisure pursuits lead many adolescents towards new and developmentally testing situations!

So, in some ways this book parallels the ideas behind the sci-fi TV series that captured many aficionados and resulted in ‘trekkies’ organizing international annual gatherings to discuss all aspects of the programme’s concepts – challenges, settings, adapting behaviours, different types of ‘alien’ encounters, noting unusual styles of apparel and realizing future possibilities and directions.

Here, we have more academic and policy-oriented purposes in mind: What we want to achieve through this book is to have current, experienced researchers reflect on their personal approach to studying adolescents and adolescence, and to encourage post-graduate students and younger researchers to be more adventurous, innovative and creative in tackling research and policy questions concerning the teenage years and their impact on the rest of the lifespan. This is an important paradigm-shift for researchers to reflect upon in a world of continuous and rapid social and technological change and where the forces of globalization interact with national and regional cultures and customs. Thus, we hope that the ideas in this book will act as a catalyst to inspire theoreticians and researchers, both experienced and relatively new to the field of study, to consider the challenges being proposed and perhaps gather together to debate the issues raised.

Within this perspective, we want to take a personal, critical and perhaps even an evangelical tone, to argue that there is a need to face challenges and consider changes of direction in studying adolescents and their transition towards adulthood to match what is occurring in the (real) world of today – and tomorrow – and how global, regional and local structures, contexts and life experiences may impact on young people’s progress towards early adulthood.

From this challenging perspective, as Côté (2015) has observed, the various disciplines now contributing to international adolescent and youth studies are mainly products of Western university infrastructures. Over the twentieth century, these studies in Western universities merged into various natural and social sciences. The roots of these sciences lie in the broader pursuit of the liberal arts, which date to antiquity (e.g. Bloom, 1987). Although various universities in non-Western countries have supported some forms of youth studies, internationally, the field has mainly arisen in Europe, North America and Australia and communications among university researchers have been primarily through English-language journals and conferences, using the current lingua franca of international academia, and thus defining the field internationally (Helve and Holm, 2005).

Accordingly, the chapters in this volume rely mainly on English publications produced in developed Western countries. In doing so, this book characterizes adolescent psychology as it has emerged in English-speaking countries, and those that use English for their international academic conferences. Thus, it is to be understood that, unless otherwise indicated, the material in this book applies to adolescent psychology in these countries. Having said that, pleas for future research will be to engage in more inter-cultural research, particularly when the aim is to find models of universal human development. We agree with Ratner (2012) that:

Culture is not a nebulous ‘sharing of customs’, ‘communicating’, ‘interacting’, ‘socializing’, ‘social context’, or ‘historical accumulation of shared practices’; nor is culture defined by a country’s name, or by single, abstract variables such as individualism-collectivism, masculine-feminine, avoidance of uncertainty, long term orientation, emotional complexity, parental control, or power distance.

Thus, one challenge is to integrate much more macro-cultural psychology into our research on adolescence, and to “identify concrete macro-cultural factors of a particular social system that is rooted in a specific political economy controlled by certain political interests” (Ratner, 2012) to fully understand the different developmental trajectories of young people in different cultures and sub-cultures. It is not enough to simply compare the means on some scale values from different countries and explain differences with some static theoretical construct whose genesis itself needs explanation.

True inter-cultural research on adolescence is sparse, and we also admit that this book is based mainly on studies from WEIRD (white, educated, industrialized, rich, democratic) samples, which are among the least representative populations one can find for generalizing about humans (Henrich et al., 2010). As Lloyd (2005) has observed some years ago, the largest generation of young people in history was making the transition from childhood to adulthood, with 86 per cent of this cohort, nearly 1.5 billion individuals, living in developing countries, experiencing a very different life from affluent Westerners:

While some young people are engaged in wars and civil strife, others are voting for the first time. While some young people are accessing the Internet, others have never been to school. Thus, despite global changes that have led to a convergence of experiences among young people in certain domains of life, the experiences of many young people remain sharply divergent.

(Lloyd, 2005, p. 580)

Nevertheless, we can be rather proud of what adolescent research has achieved in the last decades: The emphasis has shifted away from ‘storm and stress’ models of adolescence of the early twentieth century and the focus on problem behaviour towards exploring normal development and empowerment (e.g. Lerner et al., 2005). For example, Rutter (1996) has pinpointed the importance of steeling experiences, the developmental significance of rule-breaking has been highlighted (e.g. Silbereisen et al., 1987) and the social participation and civic engagement of young people (Roker et al., 1979; Zani and Barrett, 2012) have been researched. Increasingly, adolescent development is studied in context (e.g. Magnusson and Stattin, 1998; Silbereisen and Walper, 1988; Vondracek and Kawasaki, 1995) and systemic models such as Bronfenbrenner’s (1979), Elder’s (1974), Valsiner’s (1997) and Dynamic System Theory (e.g. Thelen and Smith, 1998) are in the process of substituting stage theories. Adolescent research has also found its way into policy-making, as in the 4-H youth development programme (e.g. Hamilton, 2014), the widespread use of bullying-prevention programmes and parent-training initiatives. From Csikszentmihalyi and Larson’s (1984) ‘bleeper’ method to Engels’ ‘bar laboratory’ (e.g. Engels et al., 2012; Larsen et al., 2009), from listening to young people’s own voices to person-oriented analyses of data and computer simulations, there has also been an impressive variety in new and innovative research methods.

Yet there are limitations and flaws in what has been achieved. Looking through published adolescent research papers and listening to conference presentations, one will soon become aware of a certain static ‘sameness’ of topic, methodology and findings, with an absence of theoretical underpinnings. As Hughes (2016) has noted, there is often a lack of a genuine theoretical perspective, a problematic presentation of results, a lack of disaggregated findings, an ‘over-kill’ of certain topics and a paucity of new approaches to new topics (see Box 1.1).

Chambers (2017) quotes as the main reason for shortcomings in psychological research the culture and pressures that have arisen from current publishing practices. To achieve high impact ratings, journal editors prefer to publish novel findings. Hence, researchers concentrate on producing significant and attention-grabbing results leading to what he calls the ‘seven deadly sins’ of psychological research:

• publication biases that demand novel and positive results;

• the ‘playing around with’ statistical tests to achieve statistical significance;

• the publication of low powered studies and an aversion towards replication projects;

• a reluctance to share empirical data;

• the problem of outright frauds;

• closed-access publishing;

• an obsession with criteria such as impact factors which create absurd incentives for researchers.

Chambers claims that “if we continue as we are then psychology will diminish as a reputable science and could very well disappear” (p. ix).

BOX 1.1 WHAT AILS SOCIAL SCIENCE RESEARCH?

Criticizing common research practices, mainly within leadership research, Antonakis (2017) has argued that there are five serious ‘diseases’ stifling the production of useful research. These diseases include: significosis, an inordinate focus on statistically significant results; neophilia, an excessive appreciation for novelty; theorrhea, a mania for new theory; arigorium, a deficiency of rigour in theoretical and empirical work; and finally, disjunctivitis, a proclivity to produce large quantities of redundant, trivial and incoherent works. These are seen as responses to pressures on researchers to publish several articles annually, together with the publication practices of many journals. As Antonakis commented, because research should be grounded in original theory to get published in top journals, researchers will do what it takes to make it seem ‘as if’ they have tested some novel theoretical insights:

… they firstly dig into their data to find statistically significant results that look potentially interesting and new, and then invent a plausible theory to be used up-front in the paper to give the impression that this theory drove the data-gathering and data-testing efforts of the researchers. Thus, authors are making up theory in a post-hoc way while pretending the theory was ex-ante.

(Antonakis, 2017)

He offers a set of corrective practices that can be applied across the social (and physical) sciences, developing a philosophy that allows research and its outcomes to be honest and transparent to all. He demands wide adoption of open research practices, such as a study pre-registration, open data and open materials, and wholesale revision of the systems we use to determine career progression, such as authorship rank, journal rank and grant capture. Thus, Chambers does not simply seek to reveal the problems within the social sciences, but sends a clarion-call to all practitioners to take collective action towards improvement.

Nevertheless, from approaches such as Antonakis, Hughes and Chambers – and from our own efforts within this text – the crucial question is how well can we convince colleagues to overcome their resistance to change and join our crusade for a much-needed paradigm-shift?

An example: de-constructing identity development

So, is there a need for a Western ‘revolution’ in the social sciences to match the flux and flow of changes in the life-worlds of today’s young people? If we examine the ways in which current approaches to studying adolescent development are carried out, it is possible to note concerns about the approaches taken in gaining real understanding of the processes, mechanisms, factors and forces involved in interpreting young people’s trajectories through the life course.

Too often, over-complex but ill-defined constructs are used in the academic discourse, so that studies which seemingly examine the same thing actually deal with completely different phenomena. Furthermore, these constructs are often treated as static, isolated entities, whereas most elements in a living system are dynamic, context-bound and volatile.

As an example, let us ‘de-construct’ a very popular topic for all the social science disciplines interested in adolescent research to demonstrate a need for necessary, innovative thinking that asks us to consider new directions and ensures that the field impacts usefully, both theoretically and in aiding policy decisions concerning adolescents’ transitions and transformations as they ‘move’ into adult society. If we consider identity development in all its dimensions and analyse the concepts, models, methods and approaches taken by researchers, it is possible to illustrate why innovative research directions are vital for the social sciences to pursue.

If Figure 1.1 is viewed and reflected upon, it is clear that ‘identity’ has many definitions, many underlying theories, and in turn, many methodological approaches. Côté (2015, p. 6) talks of “a social, scientific Tower of Babel”, and accuses social science factions of adopting a single perspective, and then dismissing all others. Here, using our diagram, we want to examine one sector at a time to answer the question: What then is identity?

If we commence our enquiries from the bottom of Figure 1.1, there is first the notion tha...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Table of Contents
• List of illustrations
• Notes on contributors
• Prologue
• Acknowledgements
• 1 ‘To boldly go!’ Reframing adolescent research
• 2 An idiographic approach to adolescent research: theory, method, and application
• 3 An elaboration of non-linear, non-ergodic, and self-organizing processes: understanding the bumps and jumps in adolescent development
• 4 Longitudinal methods in adolescent psychology: where could we go from here? And should we?
• 5 Using Contextual Action Theory for conceptualization and research on adolescent development
• 6 The challenge of the brain: what can the new adolescent neuroscience tell us, what are its limits, and where could it go from here?
• 7 Breaking disciplinary boundaries? An example from toxicology: endocrine disruptor chemicals and adolescents
• 8 A social psychologist’s perspective on future directions: the many faces of Youth Studies
• Epilogue: ‘Beam me up, Scottie!’
• Index