Magister Public Health - MPH / Background: Alcohol consumption among adolescents is increasing due to the general availability of alcohol in many community settings. Binge drinking (defined as drinking 5 or more drinks per occasion) (Parry, 2000) is considered the most common type of harmful alcohol consumption among young people. The United States Youth Risk Behaviour Surveillance report proposes that patterns of health risk behaviours are established during youth (Centre for Disease Control and Prevention,2006). The abovementioned report highlights behaviours such as alcohol misuse, drug use and risky sexual behaviour that have the potential to undermine the health and development of youth. Adolescent developmental theories recognise risk behaviours as central to normal adolescent development but there are complex predisposing risk factors that can cause these behaviours to compromise the healthy development of our youth. In order to design and implement effective intervention schemes, we need to understand the dynamics of alcohol use among local youth better, as these play out in their specific social environmental and personal contexts.Aim: The aim of this study was to gain an understanding of what influences the patterns of alcohol use among adolescents in a peri-urban historically disadvantaged community in the Western Cape. The study identified some of the factors that promote and inhibit drinking within the study community from the perspective of the adolescents themselves and a few of the adults who work with adolescents. The study also determined some of the harmful consequences to drinking as described by the adolescents.Method: This was an exploratory study using qualitative research methods. Four focus group discussions were conducted with adolescents aged between 14 and 19 years that were both attending and not attending school. Three key informant interviews with adults who were involved with the youth were conducted.Convenience sampling was used for the non-school attending participants and snowball sampling was used for the school attending youth. The adults in the study were purposively sampled. The study was conducted within the study setting during March and April 2009. Thematic and content analysis was used to interpret the data.The descriptive data was coded and categorised according to themes that emerged during analysis.Results: In general the youth of this study are drinking on weekends. They spend their time on the streets and access alcohol from the many illegal taverns in their neighbourhood. Some of the reasons why adolescents drink include just for the fun of it and because their friends drink and to cope with stress or boredom (risk factors for problem behaviour). Those who don’t drink generally have strong parental role models, have observed some of the harmful effects of alcohol use and seem able to resist peer pressure (protective factors for problem behaviour). There were no significant differences between the perceptions of male and female adolescents regarding alcohol consumption. The black adolescents in general appeared to be more affected by poverty than the coloured adolescents, a factor that influenced their choices around alcohol use. Risky sexual behaviour, rape and fighting seem to be some of the harmful consequences to drinking that are described by the youth of this study. The social environment in which the adolescents of this study live seemed to play a significant role in their attitudes toward drinking. Factors such as a lack of infrastructure for leisure, poverty and a tolerance for public drunkenness are community factors that affect these adolescents but over which they have little or no control.Conclusion: The potential for problem behaviour as perceived by the participants is determined by the balance of risk and protective factors that emanate from their social environment, the community itself and their own personality. Those fortunate enough to have cohesive families with interested adults around them are more likely to be protected from problem behaviour due to drinking.Recommendations: Recommendations from this study include engaging with the youth directly when designing intervention programmes; using peer-led programmes to effect change and to help adolescents to clarify their values; equip them with skills to plan for the future in order to develop their self-efficacy to make the right choices when it comes to alcohol consumption. It is also recommended that intervention programmes address relationships within the community itself such as strengthening parent-child communication; building positive adult role models and empowering community members to challenge issues such as illegal tavern owners serving alcohol to minors.

Recent intervention efforts in promoting positive identity in troubled adolescents have begun to draw on the potential for an integration of the self-construction and self-discovery perspectives in conceptualizing identity processes, as well as the integration of quantitative and qualitative data analytic strategies. This study reports an investigation of the Changing Lives Program (CLP), using an Outcome Mediation (OM) evaluation model, an integrated model for evaluating targets of intervention, while theoretically including a Self-Transformative Model of Identity Development (STM), a proposed integration of self-discovery and self-construction identity processes. This study also used a Relational Data Analysis (RDA) integration of quantitative and qualitative analysis strategies and a structural equation modeling approach (SEM), to construct and evaluate the hypothesized OM/STM model. The CLP is a community supported positive youth development intervention, targeting multi-problem youth in alternative high schools in the Miami Dade County Public Schools (M-DCPS). The 259 participants for this study were drawn from the CLP’s archival data file. The model evaluated in this study utilized three indices of core identity processes (1) personal expressiveness, (2) identity conflict resolution, and (3) informational identity style that were conceptualized as mediators of the effects of participation in the CLP on change in two qualitative outcome indices of participants’ sense of self and identity. Findings indicated the model fit the data (χ2 (10) = 3.638, p = .96; RMSEA = .00; CFI = 1.00; WRMR = .299). The pattern of findings supported the utilization of the STM in conceptualizing identity processes and provided support for the OM design. The findings also suggested the need for methods capable of detecting and rendering unique sample specific free response data to increase the likelihood of identifying emergent core developmental research concepts and constructs in studies of intervention/developmental change over time in ways not possible using fixed response methods alone.

This study reported an Outcome Mediation Cascade evaluation of the Changing Lives Program (CLP), a positive youth intervention. This study examined the effects of participation in the CLP on positive outcomes (Personal Expressiveness and Well-Being) and negative outcomes (Internalizing and Externalizing problem behaviors) as mediated by Identity Distress. 137 females and 101 males comprised the sample of this study, which draws from archival data of adolescents in alternative high schools in Miami. Findings indicated that the hypothesized model fit the data (χ2 (11) = 14.544, p = .020; RMSEA = .04; CFI = .995; SRMR = .028). Findings also provided preliminary evidence consistent with the hypothesis that in addition to having effects on targeted positive outcomes, PYD interventions are likely to have progressive cascading effects on untargeted problem outcomes.

During the beginning of the cinema media era around the turn of 20th century, a debate prevailed in Sweden about the film’s harmful and negative moral impact on children and young people. This study aims to investigate the debaters’ knowledge claims regarding a preview of a publicly shown film and if it is related to their morality. The following questions were asked: 1. What knowledge claims are made in connection with the need for prior control over the film that is shown in public? 2. What is presented as the basis for the legitimacy of these knowledge claims? 3. How do these knowledge claims change during its path to legal text? 4. What was the relationship between the presented knowledge claims and a moral perception prevailing among the debaters? A debate paper, a parliamentary motion from 1909 and the public inquiry before the decision to create the Swedish Agency of Movie Censors were analysed with argumentation analysis and thematic analysis with a perspective of history of knowledge. This study points at various aspects such as medical, psychological, social structure and moral arguments, which were put forward as arguments for a regulation of the new film medium. The knowledge claims were justified by professional expertise, general knowledge, experiences from other countries and the debaters’ prior knowledge of the subject. A strong fear of ruining a good existing moral conception that exists in the growing generation emerges. The analysis describes a change in knowledge claims: the moral arguments diminish along the way towards the legal text. Furthermore, the study points at the necessity for continued research to increase the understanding of how legitimacy of knowledge is created by an influential group and then passed on.

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Syftet med studie är att undersöka hur de skandinaviska länderna och dess specialidrottsförbund ser på barn- och ungdomsutveckling inom motocross samt hur detta kan förstås. Detta har genomförts med hjälp av en dokumentanalys och de dokument som förbunden har publicerade på respektives webbsida. I studien framgår det att förbunden använder sig av olika koncept för att utveckla talangfulla förare. Det presenteras likheter och skillnader i respektive lands syn på idrott och att uppbyggnaden av idrotten i respektive land har en inverkan på barn- och ungdomsutvecklingen. Det presenteras även att förbundens insatser är relativt lik den linje kring hur landet vill att idrotten ska bedrivas. / The purpose of the study is to investigate how the Scandinavian countries and its special sports federations view child- and youth development in motocross, as well as how this can be understood. This has been carried out using a content analysis and the documents published by the federations on their website. The study shows that the federations uses different concepts to develop talented drivers. Similarities and differences are presented in each country's view of sport and that the construction of sport in each country has an impact on the child- and youth development. It is also presented that the efforts of the federations are relatively similar to the line on how the country wants sport to be conducted.

FC Rosengård bedriver flertalet sociala projekt. Ett av dessa projekt är Football for Life som i Sydafrika har som målsättning att stärka unga kvinnors självbild och rättigheter. Studien “Football for Life, så mycket mer än bara fotboll” ämnar att utvärdera denna verksamhet med hjälp av Teaching Personal and Social Responsibility modellen. Detta för att visualisera i vilken mån deltagarna i verksamheten erhåller ett ökat personligt- och socialt ansvarstagande. Studiens slutgiltiga målsättning är att stärka argumentet för att en liknande verksamhet ska initieras i Sverige genom att påvisa vilken inverkan Football for Life har haft för de deltagande tjejerna i Sydafrika. Tvärsnittsstudien är av kvantitativ karaktär där enkäter har varit den primära källan till empiri. Vidare har även relevant litteratur på ämnet Positive Youth Development bidragit till den slutgiltiga produkten. De huvudsakliga aspekter som undersökts i studien är deltagarnas upplevda effort, caring/helping, respect och self-direction kopplat till hur Football for Life har/har haft en inverkan på individen inom dessa områden. Enkäten distribuerades av personalen på plats i Sydafrika där en grupp individer som inte har deltagit i verksamheten agerade som kontrollgrupp. Dessa deltog i studien tillsammans med deltagare som i olika utsträckning varit en del av Football for Life’s verksamhet i olika utsträckning. På förhand förväntades de som haft ett djupare engagemang i Football for Life uppvisa större upplevt personligt- och socialt ansvarstagande jämfört med de som inte deltagit i verksamheten. Resultaten påvisar i viss mån att så inte var fallet, den största skillnaden mellan deltagarnas upplevda personliga- och sociala ansvarstagande återfanns mellan de som inte deltagit vid något tillfälle och de som deltagit ett fåtal gånger. Det återfanns dock skillnader mellan de som inte deltagit och de som haft en stor involvering i verksamheten, men inte i den utsträckning som kunnat tänkas på förhand. Vidare förs en diskussion som resonerar kring de resultat som framkom för att besvara bad resultatet kan bero på. Utöver detta behandlas även Teaching and Personal Responsibility modellens lämplighet vid utvärdering av ett program med anknytning till Positive Youth Development. / Football for Life in South Africa is one of many social project that is managed by the football club FC Rosengård. Football for Life is a Positive Youth Development program which aims to strengthen the young female participants regarding their confidence as well as to educate them regarding their personal rights in the South African society. The sex roles in South Africa is in many regards skew, especially seeing that women are barely allowed to participate in physical activities, which is one of FC Rosengård’s major driving forces for managing Football for Life. In order to ensure the quality of the activities, as well as to examine the possibilities of initiating a project of similar characteristics in Sweden, this essay was set of on the behalf of FC Rosengård. By studying the participants at scene in South Africa by utilising a questionnaire, their perceived personal- and social responsibility was investigated. The participants in the study was categorized depending on their involvement in Football for Life in order to visualise whether the project has a positive effect regarding the development of personal- and social responsibility.

In South Africa, the majority of youth entering emerging adulthood find themselves in a protracted struggle to access further education, training or to secure their first decent job. The purpose of this multi-case study is to deepen the understanding of how capability measurement approaches and tools can empower marginalized youth to better understand their aspirations and map their way through emerging adulthood and out of poverty. This research aims to deepen the understanding of youth's experience utilizing 'Poverty Stoplight'; a poverty measurement and capability building instrument that utilizes a self-assessment survey and mentorship methodology. The researcher utilized a youth-focused participatory approach in conducting focus groups and in-depth one-on-one interviews across five marginalized communities in the Western Cape to gain insight into their experience using the tool, their ability to envision their future selves and develop their aspirations. What emerged from the data were insights into the youth's aspirations, the perceived enabling factors and impediments towards their aspirations and their experiences utilizing Poverty Stoplight. This process enabled youth to genuinely reflect and assess their situation, and have the opportunity to define their aspirations. Overall the Poverty Stoplight programme was experienced as empowering by participants, with several implications for the programme pertaining to data accessibility, communication, mentorship and solution sharing, as well as the importance of youth-specific participatory approaches. Aligned to this, the findings yielded several recommendations pertaining to providing support and enabling opportunities for emerging adults to realise their aspirations. Despite the limitations of this research, this study is relevant for stakeholders in South Africa and globally as it examines the critical issue of youth development, with a focus on the ability of young people to attain their aspirations. Further, it analyses the capability measurement approach as a means to ensuring young people can better understand and plot their way out of poverty, making the most of their individual capabilities and attributes within the broader structural and systemic challenges they face. This exploration of practical tools and methodologies being developed and utilized by pioneering organisations in the South African context provides empirical evidence of the merit of such approaches, with recommendations on how tools and approaches can even better serve the needs of youth. Further, longitudinal research is merited into the use of such capability measurement approaches to empower youth and the further use of participatory methodologies.

No description available.

No description available.