Hope in Context: Developmental Profiles of Trust, Hopeful Future Expectations, and Civic Engagement Across Adolescence

Abstract

Hopeful expectations for the future have been shown to play an important role in the positive development of youth, including youth contributions to society. Although theory and some research suggest that familial socialization may influence future-oriented cognitions, little work has focused on the possible interrelation of parent-child relationships and the development of hope, particularly during adolescence. Accordingly, the first goal of this study was to identify developmental profiles of youth with respect to hopeful future expectations (HFE) and parental trust across adolescence. Next, we explored whether these developmental trajectories were related to youth Contribution, indexed by community leadership, service, and helping attitudes and behaviors. We used growth mixture modeling to simultaneously examine trajectories of adolescents' perceived connections with parents (indexed by parent trust) and HFE among 1,432 participants (59% female) from Waves 3 through 6 (Grades 7 through 10) of the 4-H Study of Positive Youth Development. A four-profile model provided the best fit to the data, with the following profiles: Moderate HFE/U-shaped Trust; Moderate HFE/Increasing Trust; Both Decreasing; and Both High Stable profiles. We then explored whether hope-trust profiles were related to youth Contribution in Wave 7. Contrary to hypotheses, results indicated that the profile reflecting the greatest discrepancy in HFE and trust across early to middle adolescence (i.e., Moderate Hope/U-shaped Trust) was associated with the highest mean Contribution scores. The implications of the findings for future theory and research are discussed.

Warm and Supportive Parenting Can Discourage Offspring’s Civic Engagement in the Transition to Adulthood

“…We chose Finland as a study setting because social democratic regimes (i.e., Finland and other Nordic countries) differ in important ways from both North American countries, where most of prior findings on the positive link between supportive parenting and civic engagement originate (e.g., Mahatmya & Lohman 2012;Fletcher et al 2000;Gagné 2003;Lewin-Bizan et al 2010;Pancer et al 2007;Schmid Callina et al 2014), and South and East European countries, where nonsignificant or even negative associations between supportive family relationships and civic engagement were sometimes found (Alesina & Giuliano 2011;Kanacri et al 2014;Marzana et al 2012;. Similarly to the non-Hispanic White populations of the US and Canada, Finland boasts high rates of civic engagement, also among young people (around 70% of university students volunteer; Haski-Leventhal et al 2010).…”

“…We considered the role of age when parenting was assessed in an exploratory fashion, because prior literature on parenting and civic engagement offered few clues on the potential influence of a life stage. Existing longitudinal studies in this field had too short time intervals between assessments to enable any conclusions about life-stage differences (LewinBizan et al 2010;Mahatmya & Lohman 2012;Schmid Callina et al 2014;Wray-Lake & Flanagan 2012). …”

“…Parental warmth and appropriate demandingness (i.e., authoritative parenting; Baumrind 1991) are thought to make youth more caring, better regulated, more trusting, and more socially responsible, qualities that may promote both motivation and ability to make civic contributions (Lewin-Bizan, Bowers, & Lerner 2010;Pancer & Pratt 1999;Schmid Callina, Johnson, Buckingham, & Lerner 2014;Wray-Lake & Flanagan 2012). Autonomy supportive parenting satisfies the basic psychological needs of autonomy, competence, and belonging, freeing youth's psychological resources to pay attention to the other's needs (Gagné 2003).…”

“…Supporting empirical evidence for the broader influence of positive parenting comes from many North American studies that found warm, supportive, or authoritative parenting reported by adolescents or their parents or observed during family interactions to predict young people's social trust (Wray-Lake & Flanagan 2012), concern for future generations (Lawford, Pratt, Hunsberger, & Pancer 2005), and civic engagement (Mahatmya & Lohman 2012;Fletcher et al 2000;Gagné 2003;Pancer, Pratt, Hunsberger, & Alisat 2007), also via fostering their positive individual attributes (Lewin-Bizan et al 2010;Schmid Callina et al 2014) and psychological need satisfaction (Gagné 2003). These effects were found both in non-Hispanic White and in ethnically diverse samples and held for an impressive range of civic outcomes, including volunteering and community service, blood donations, voting, conventional political participation, and social action.…”

“…In African American adolescents, Smetana and Metzger (2005) found no significant effects of maternal warmth, support, and cooperative behaviors in observed dyadic interactions on adolescent subsequent volunteering and political participation, although positive effects of mothers' confident and respectful communication did emerge. Schmid Callina et al (2014) found that US adolescents who reported a drop in trust toward their parents, followed by a recovery, also reported the highest levels of contribution to their communities. Furthermore, Omoto and Snyder (1995) found negative effects of perceived general social support from multiple sources, including family members, on the duration of AIDS-related volunteering in US adults.…”