Existing research on LBGTQ youth has focused on problem behaviors and considerably less attention has been devoted to positive developmental processes. However, positive youth development knowledge is critical to enabling researchers and practitioners to conduct work that might facilitate a successful transition to adulthood. Thus, the purpose of this study was to explore the transition to adulthood among LBGTQ youth. Data were generated through ethnographic techniques at an organized leisure program designed to serve LBGTQ youth and their heterosexual allies. Thematic analysis yielded three manuscripts designed for journal submission. Results of the first study enhanced understanding of the similarities and differences between queer and heterosexual development. In particular, findings indicated that traditional assumptions about markers of success and developmental assets were highly relevant to most participants. The key difference between queer and heterosexual development was that LBGTQ populations must contend with compulsory heterosexuality or the network of normative expectations and sanctions which compel individuals to be heterosexual. For instance, participants shared how they hid their sexuality often for years to avoid being labeled as different or facing harassment. I explored resistance and oppression in the leisure experiences of LBGTQ youth in the second study to further expand understanding of positive developmental processes among queer young people. Results indicated that participants resisted oppression in several ways, including creating spaces that preserved their autonomy. Others deconstructed the privilege in their lives, which enhanced their understanding of how their actions intersect with the oppression of others. In the third study, I explored features of positive developmental settings for LBGTQ youth to explore how leisure contexts might facilitate the transition to adulthood for queer youth. Two features emerged as particularly relevant: support for efficacy and mattering and integration of school, family, and community efforts. Results indicated that staff promoted social norms that respected the capabilities of all people. Further, the integration of program activities within the broader queer community led to important successes related to celebrating the heterogeneity of queer and promoting communion. I hope these manuscripts will enhance the capacity of leisure professionals to work with LBGTQ youth.

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This study modeled trajectories of four psychosocial competencies (autonomy, industry, identity, and intimacy) across four years of university and year-to-year covariation of these competencies with typical student experiences (living away from parents, academic performance, dating, and alcohol use) in 195 Canadian students. Analyses revealed that, on average, autonomy and identity did not change over time. Accounting for gender differences, however, revealed some linear changes across time for these competencies. Industry and intimacy showed curvilinear trajectories of change. Year-to-year, students reported higher autonomy and identity when living away from their parents and when getting higher grades. They also reported higher industry when getting higher grades. When students dated they reported higher identity and intimacy; dating women also reported higher autonomy than dating men. When dating students reported higher intimacy they reported higher perceived affection within their romantic relationships. Possible mechanisms for the observed patterns and their implications are discussed.

American family life has undergone drastic changes over the last five decades. The median age at first marriage has risen sharply over that time, a trend that has attracted the attention of a number of family scholars. Less is known, however, about those who continue to marry early in a society where such a practice is increasingly rare and where the benefits to marriage during young adulthood are thought to be diminishing. In this dissertation, I ask specifically (a) what types of people continue to marry early in a context where delayed marriage is the norm, (b) how culture can impact marital timing, and (c) what effect marriage has on the mental health and well-being of young adults. To answer these questions, I analyze survey data primarily from the first and third waves of the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health, a panel study of American adolescents that began in 1994-95 and tracked its respondents into young adulthood in 2001-02. The results suggest that a significant minority of young adults—25% of women and 16% of men—marry early, and early marriage occurs most frequently among young adults with low educational trajectories and who come from families with more limited resources. These young adults are typically found in rural communities and in the Southern United States, and they tend to identify with conservative religious traditions like conservative Protestantism and Mormonism. Culture, in the case of involvement in a religious community, can shape marriage timing by limiting the appeal of cohabitation, increasing marital desires and expectations, and by reducing perceived conflict between marriage and higher education. Moreover, a prevailing cultural schema that prescribes full time work as a prerequisite for marriage keeps even young adults who wish they were married from doing so. Finally, young adults who are married or engaged exhibit the best mental health in young adulthood. These findings suggest that demographic and cultural shifts in marriage have not spread evenly throughout the population, and despite its poor reputation early marriage may have some benefits for young adults. / text

Social Assistance – also known as welfare – has been a program of last resort for individuals in poverty across Canada for many years. The use of social assistance in early adulthood is of particular interest, as these individuals have a long life of consequences ahead of them. The social assistance program available in Manitoba, Canada – the setting of this study – is Employment and Income Assistance (EIA). This study examines difference in predictors of early adult (ages 18-25) EIA usage across income quintiles of the neighborhoods individuals lived in as they enter young adulthood (age 18) and the type of EIA (General Assistance, Single Parent or Disability) received.

The present study examined individuation and expectations for autonomous behavior (EAB) with incoming college freshmen and their parents. To test the theory that greater mismatch between young adults and their parents about EAB would be associated with more negative adjustment to college, Collins' (1990) Expectancy-Violation Model was applied. Data were initially collected with online questionnaires from incoming college freshmen and one of their parents before the transition to college. Follow-up data (W2) were collected three months later to assess adjustment to college. Individuation was measured with the Late Adolescence Individuation Questionnaire; EAB and reports of actual autonomous behavior were assessed with a measure based on the Psychological Separation Inventory. College student adjustment was measured with indicators of psychological well-being (i.e., psychosomatic symptoms, depressive symptoms, positive affect) and adaptation to college (i.e., college self-efficacy, satisfaction with college, and anticipated fall college grades). Open-ended data were collected from young adults and their parents describing topics of autonomy behavior where they perceived disagreement. A MANOVA indicated that there were significant differences between the four individuation groups (a) individuated (high connectedness and high separateness), (b) pseudoautonomous (low connectedness and high separateness), (c) dependent (high connectedness and low separateness), and (d) ambiguous (low connectedness and low separateness) on the young adults' adjustment to college. Post-hoc planned comparisons revealed that college students in the "individuated" group were consistently better off than those in the "ambiguous" group. Some support was found for the hypothesis that a higher discrepancy (a) between parent and young adult EAB and (b) between young adults' reports of expected versus actual autonomous behaviors was associated with lower W2 young adult well-being. Quality of parent-young adult communication was found to moderate some of these associations. Qualitative data somewhat supported the quantitative results, as well as illustrated unique areas for disagreement on EAB. Jointly, these quantitative and qualitative findings suggest that young adults' level of individuation from parents and a mismatch between parents' and young adults' perceptions of future autonomous behavior may impact college students' psychological well-being during the transition to college.

abstract: Life course criminology is characterized by a two-pronged approach to research. The first branch emphasizes social integration and involvement with pro-social institutions as turning points in the criminal career. The second branch of this work assesses how access to the institutions that facilitate social integration are conditioned by factors such as involvement in the criminal justice system. Theories of capital are chiefly concerned with social integration and the continuity of conventionality, conformity, and prosperity offered through social ties and social networks. Absent from life course criminology is a better understanding of how different forms of criminal capital can influence access to institutions like higher education, marriage, and employment during the transition to adulthood. Drawing on insights from distinct bodies of literature on peers, capital, and status attainment, the present study elaborates on the influence of criminal capital for (un)successful transitions to adulthood. Using three waves of data from the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent to Adult Health (“Add Health”), the effects of adolescent criminal social capital on criminal cultural and human capital, and subsequent educational, occupational, and marital attainment in early adulthood are examined. Results from a series of regression models demonstrate that criminal social capital has minimal effects on fatalistic beliefs or thoughtful and reflective decision making, and that these forms of criminal capital generally have inconsistent effects on later life transitions. Implications for theory and future research are discussed. / Dissertation/Thesis / Doctoral Dissertation Criminology and Criminal Justice 2016

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Yes / Transitioning to adulthood is a fundamental yet challenging phase in human development. Despite its relevance, the literature has paid little attention to the impact that transitioning to adulthood has on multiple aspects of individual well-being. This is one of the few attempts that has employed a sequential explanatory mixed-methods study to explore how the path to adulthood impacted on the psychological and overall well-being of Italian young adults. In the quantitative phase, we employed two-step cluster analysis to assign 45 young adults, who had completed the Italian I COPPE scale of multidimensional well-being, to three clusters based on their level of change in psychological and overall well-being. Results from mixed design ANCOVA revealed that participants belonging to the high change cluster showed the highest significant positive change over time with respect to well-being. In the qualitative phase, 17 individuals took part in focalized narrative interviews, which aimed at exploring significant events, barriers, and facilitators, which had impacted on their well-being during the transition to adulthood. The textual material was analysed through the Grounded Theory Methodology. It emerged that the state of transition was associated with some triggering events and a temporary negative impact on the interviewees' well-being. However, findings also revealed that people assigned to different clusters had put in place or learned several resources, skills, and copying strategies, which led to different transitional and well-being outcomes.

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