The five Cs of positive youth development in Norway

Abstract

As the field of positive youth development (PYD) emerges internationally, models of PYD designed for use in the US must be extended to diverse contexts. For instance, a robust body of evidence supports Lerner and colleagues’ Five Cs Model of PYD in the US, but it remains unclear whether the Five Cs Model can validly capture positive development in other contexts. In this article we examined the Five Cs of PYD using data from 1195 upper secondary school students (ages 16 to 19) in Norway and 839 participants who took part in the 4-H Study of PYD in the United States. Despite some differences, the tests of weak and strong measurement invariance do suggest that the overarching PYD factor as well as a majority of the Cs, retain their qualitative interpretation between the two samples. We next examined correlations between the full battery of PYD items administered to the Norwegian sample and three relevant criterion measures: Anxiety and Depressive symptoms; Life Satisfaction; and Empowerment. The residual Cs tended to correlate positively with indicators of adaptive development and negatively with maladaptive outcomes. The one exception was a positive correlation between Caring and Anxiety and Depressive symptoms. These findings are discussed. Measuring the same constructs in the same way across countries is a prerequisite for studying cultural differences and similarities in development. This study thus represents a step forward in the application of PYD research among diverse youth.

Predictive Effect of Positive Youth Development Attributes on Delinquency Among Adolescents in Mainland China

“…To sum up, our findings explicate the complex associations between PYD dimensions and delinquency, which echo previous findings that some aspects of PYD attributes may not necessarily have positive predictions on adolescent developmental outcomes (Holsen et al, 2017;Lázaro-Visa et al, 2019). For example, while empathy, self-esteem, and emotional competence showed positive predictions on life satisfaction, cognitive competence was not a significant predictor when all these positive attributes were analyzed together (Lázaro-Visa et al, 2019).…”

“…Although initially counterintuitive, this finding kindly mirrors the previous finding that caring, one C in Lerner's (Lerner et al, 2011). Five Cs model ("connection, " "confidence, " "competence, " "character, " and "caring"), was positively related to anxiety and depressive symptoms when the effects of other Cs were statistically controlled (Holsen et al, 2017). It is argued that a high level of caring may represent adolescents' emotional hypersensitivity that may make them manifest stronger anxiety and depressive feelings (Holsen et al, 2017).…”

The Five Cs of Positive Youth Development in a school context; gender and mediator effects

“…Examples of items are: 'Helping other people' and 'Telling the truth, even when it's not easy'. Previous CFAs (Holsen et al, 2016) showed that character in Norwegian material formed into two distinct residual factors, personal values (pv) and social conscience (sc).…”

“…Although the Five Cs are thought of and studied as one global PYD construct to place youth on a positive pathway, examination of individual Cs may provide an additional, nuanced picture of PYD (Geldhof, 2014).For instance, Holsen, Geldhof, Larsen, and Aardal (2016) studied correlations between each C and indicators of both positive and maladaptive developmental outcomes and found each of the Five Cs correlating positively with indicators of adaptive development (life satisfaction and empowerment) and negatively with maladaptive outcomes (symptoms of anxiety and depression), except caring, which correlated positively with anxiety and depressive symptoms.…”

The Five Cs of Positive Youth Development in an Aotearoa/New Zealand Program Context

“…Other researchers have begun to look at the Five Cs, among them Holsen, Geldhof, Larsen, and Aardal (2016), who adapted a Five C measure for Norway and compared the results of a sample of nearly 1200 Norwegian adolescents in a school-based program promoting mental health and empowerment to those of a sample from the 4-H study. Invariance tests between overlapping measurement items across the two samples showed that both PYD and the Cs appeared to be experienced similarly in both settings.…”