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With the present study, we aimed to evaluate the effectiveness of youth development program implemented in one of the high schools in Vilnius, Lithuania. 351 ninth to tenth grade students participated in an 8 weeks long Youth Development (YD) program with the 4 month long optional volunteering possibilities and were compared to 262 students in a demographically and academically similar control high school. Both the participants of the YD program and the controls were evaluated three times during one academic year. Pre-test, post-test and follow-up evaluations in an experimental and control group were conducted. The results showed limited time effect on connection. The change of contribution, internalizing and externalizing problems to the direction opposite than hypothesized were found over the one year for both groups.

The present study examined the influence of the three basic psychological needs on autonomous motivation in educational settings in the light of additive, synergistic, and balance hypotheses. Participants were 679 high school students (M age = 16.16, 49.3% girls). The findings supported the additive hypothesis: all three needs had unique effects on autonomous motivation. The synergistic hypothesis was only partially supported: one two-way interaction between autonomy and competence had effect on autonomous motivation. A high level of satisfaction of the need for autonomy led to autonomous motivation regardless of satisfaction of the need for competence. However, competence was positively related to autonomous motivation only when the need for autonomy was low. The balance hypothesis was also supported: balance in needs satisfaction had a significant effect in addition to additive and synergistic effects.