In 1995, Washington State passed the Becca Bill, reversing existing law in Washington State and putting the state in conflict with United States law and the United Nations Childrens Rights Convention. These laws and convention prioritized voluntary services for runaways and other so-called status offendersjuveniles committing offenses that would not be considered crimes for adults. But despite the fact that both sides argued in support of protecting the safety and best interests of children, the debate leading to the Becca Bill was highly conflictual.
This research argues that models for serving runaway, homeless, and at-risk youth contain an implicit prioritization of two conflicting valuessafety and choice, and that respondent attitudes towards the different models are related to the respondents own values hierarchies. Comparing the values and attitudes of staff working in youth services in Washington state with those in two adjacent states/provinces with a different configuration of laws related to youth permits examination not only of the relationship between values and attitudes, but also between values and the normative-legal environment. Finally, a comparison of the values and attitudes of staff according to the types of program in which they work offers data regarding the relationship between values and epistemic communities.
Despite the efforts of social scientist researchers over the past 50-100 years, debates continue about the exact meaning of institution and values, the origins of institutions and values, the parameters around them, and what causes them to change. The challenge is not simply academic, for the very concepts of institutions and values imply entities that have great influence in the daily life of individuals. This research thus provides insight both in the area of policy and that of theory regarding values and institutions.
The results of the research show that staff values are related to a combination of personal experience, the technical considerations of the work, and the epistemic communities within which they operate. No correlation of values and attitudes is found with the normative legal environment. Significant differences are found, however, according to the type of agency in which staff work.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:PITT/oai:PITTETD:etd-05172009-140654 |
| Date | 26 June 2009 |
| Creators | Rudnicki, Ann Allison |
| Contributors | Louis A. Picard, Ph. D., Debra K. Boyer, Ph.D., Paul J. Nelson, Ph.D., Lee S. Weinberg, Ph.D. |
| Publisher | University of Pittsburgh |
| Source Sets | University of Pittsburgh |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | text |
| Format | application/pdf |
| Source | http://etd.library.pitt.edu/ETD/available/etd-05172009-140654/ |
| Rights | unrestricted, I hereby certify that, if appropriate, I have obtained and attached hereto a written permission statement from the owner(s) of each third party copyrighted matter to be included in my thesis, dissertation, or project report, allowing distribution as specified below. I certify that the version I submitted is the same as that approved by my advisory committee. I hereby grant to University of Pittsburgh or its agents the non-exclusive license to archive and make accessible, under the conditions specified below, my thesis, dissertation, or project report in whole or in part in all forms of media, now or hereafter known. I retain all other ownership rights to the copyright of the thesis, dissertation or project report. I also retain the right to use in future works (such as articles or books) all or part of this thesis, dissertation, or project report. |
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