Harm, opportunity, optimism: Young people’s negotiation of precarious circumstances

2017 ◽  
Vol 62 (1) ◽  
pp. 185-197 ◽  
Author(s):  
Robyn Munford ◽  
Jackie Sanders

Drawing on data from a longitudinal study of young people’s transitions to adulthood, this article explores the experiences of young people who face high levels of adversity. These young people had experienced challenging circumstances from an early age (exposure to harm and to impoverished social and material conditions). This article draws on the qualitative phase of the study. Young people and a trusted other, nominated by the young person, participated in three annual qualitative interviews. The article explores experiences in two domains: education and employment. It concludes with a discussion of the implications for practice with young people who face adversity.

BMJ Open ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 9 (9) ◽  
pp. e029107 ◽  
Author(s):  
Tim Rapley ◽  
Albert Farre ◽  
Jeremy R Parr ◽  
Victoria J Wood ◽  
Debbie Reape ◽  
...  

ObjectiveThe WHO has argued that adolescent-responsive health systems are required. Developmentally appropriate healthcare (DAH) for young people is one approach that could underpin this move. The aim of this study was to explore the potential for DAH to become normalised, to become a routine, taken-for-granted, element of clinical practice.DesignQualitative ethnographic study. Analyses were based on procedures from first-generation grounded theory and theoretically informed by normalisation process theory.SettingTwo tertiary and one secondary care hospital in England.Participants192 participants, health professionals (n=121) and managers (n=71) were recruited between June 2013 and January 2015. Approximately 1600 hours of non-participant observations in clinics, wards and meeting rooms were conducted, alongside 65 formal qualitative interviews.ResultsWe observed diverse values and commitments towards the care of young people and provision of DAH, including a distributed network of young person-orientated practitioners. Informal networks of trust existed, where specific people, teams or wards were understood to have the right skill-mix, or mindset, or access to resources, to work effectively with young people. As young people move through an organisation, the preference is to direct them to other young person-orientated practitioners, so inequities in skills and experience can be self-sustaining. At two sites, initiatives around adolescent and young adult training remained mostly within these informal networks of trust. At another, through support by wider management, we observed a programme that sought to make the young people’s healthcare visible across the organisation, and to get people to reappraise values and commitment.ConclusionTo move towards normalisation of DAH within an organisation, we cannot solely rely on informal networks and cultures of young person-orientated training, practice and mutual referral and support. Organisation-wide strategies and training are needed, to enable better integration and consistency of health services for all young people.


2020 ◽  
pp. 003802612097034
Author(s):  
Rachel Thomson ◽  
Jeanette Østergaard

In this article we engage critically with how metaphors have been used in sociological youth studies, including a turn to new metaphors that capture the foreclosure of futures and experiences of waiting, delay and non-institutional temporalities. Drawing on the resources of queer theory we challenge the developmentalism that underpins youth studies, employing notions of the impasse and growing sideways to capture the open-endedness of young adult lives. Working with data from a qualitative longitudinal study of Danish youth, we focus on how 47 young people responded to an invitation to talk about and through an object that represented the last three years of their lives. These rich accounts can be understood as examples of Paul Riceour’s ‘metaphoric discourse’, characterised by the simultaneity of ‘is’ and ‘is not’. The article first offers a schema of the biographical objects (trophies, hobbies, mortal, connective and protest) that captures the work of ‘being in time’ for young adults, mapping this onto the formal and informal markers of adulthood. We then engage with participants’ own metaphorical thinking in greater depth – suggesting that the paradoxical metaphors that emerge from their talk can expand how we understand the struggle for maturity. The metaphor of open-endedness is offered as a hybrid term, allowing us to look in two directions at once: capturing and comparing transitions as part of a project of social justice, while also recognising the limits of such frameworks for understanding the experiences of a new generation.


Author(s):  
Marianne Quirouette ◽  
Tyler Frederick ◽  
Jean Hughes ◽  
Jeff Karabanow ◽  
Sean Kidd

AbstractYouth without housing experience more regulation and conflict with criminal justice than their housed counterparts. Using in-depth qualitative interviews with fifty-one young people, we focus on how efforts to move away from homelessness towards long-term housing stability are impacted by conflict with law, a term referring to a broad range of experiences with various authorities in the legal system, social services, shelters, etc. Our paper comes out of a yearlong longitudinal study of the factors and processes affecting the transition away from youth homelessness in Toronto and Halifax. We consider practical barriers generated by conflict with law, but also the role that it can play in shaping the identity processes at the heart of successful transitions. Our findings highlight how conflict with law and regulation—even occurring before and during homelessness—has serious repercussions for young people well after they have left the streets.


GIS Business ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 14 (4) ◽  
pp. 122-129
Author(s):  
Monika Bansal ◽  
Sh. Lbs Arya Mahila

Youth Mentoring is the process of matching mentors with young people who need or want a caring responsible adult in their lives. It is defined as an on-going relationship between a caring adult and a young person which is required for self-development, professional growth and carrier development of the mentee and mentors both and all this must be placed within a specific institution context. The purpose of this article is to quantitatively review the three major areas of mentoring research (youth, academic, and workplace) to determine the overall effect size associated with mentoring outcomes for students.


2021 ◽  
pp. 002204262098651
Author(s):  
Marit Edland-Gryt

Clubbing is an important part of the nighttime economy, and cocaine use is, for some young people, an essential part of this clubbing culture. However, the interaction rituals around the use of powder cocaine in this context remain understudied. This study is based on qualitative interviews with young adult recreational cocaine users ( n = 28) and explores how they use cocaine in club settings, in relation to rituals and drinking culture. The analysis identified three main explanations for using cocaine: (a) unity with friends because of shared transgression, (b) the high as a “collective effervescence,” and (c) the possibility to control, extend, and intensify drinking to intoxication. These three explanations illustrate how cocaine rituals were deeply integrated in drinking-to-intoxication rituals, and how the illegality of cocaine use reinforced feelings of unity with friends. In the nighttime economy, cocaine use and its related rituals are used to intensify and control alcohol-fuelled partying.


Author(s):  
Daniel Falla ◽  
Rosario Ortega-Ruiz ◽  
Eva M. Romera

The internet is an area where young people establish relationships and develop socially, emotionally and morally, but it also gives rise to certain forms of online behaviour, such as cybergossip, which are associated with cyberaggression and other risky behaviour. The aims of this study were to verify whether a longitudinal association exists between cybergossip and cyberaggression, and to discover which mechanisms of moral disengagement may mediate this relationship. The final sample consisted of 1392 students (50% girls; Mage = 13.47; SD = 0.77), who were surveyed in a three-wave longitudinal study at six-month intervals. The results obtained confirmed a direct, positive relationship between cybergossip, subsequent cyberaggression and the mediation exerted by cognitive restructuring in this transition. We discuss the importance of recognizing and detecting the fine distinction between online gossip and cyberaggression with the intention of doing harm, and focus on the justifications used by young people to normalize online bullying. To sum up, there is a clear need to encourage ethical, responsible behaviour in online interactions in order to achieve well-balanced, more sustainable relationships in classrooms.


2020 ◽  
pp. 103985622097005
Author(s):  
Oliver Smith ◽  
Jessica Bergmann ◽  
Ulrich Schall

Objective: General practitioners (GPs) are key health professionals for referrals to mental health specialists. Youth mental health issues are particularly challenging, requiring a competent assessment and understanding of appropriate referral pathways. We surveyed local GPs about their understanding of youth mental health problems and needs to competently look after young patients. Methods: GPs working in the Hunter region were contacted via email, fax and post over a 6-month period in 2019. Results: Seventy-five GPs participated. They reported 577 of 1698 (34%) of young people seen 2 weeks prior to being surveyed presented with a mental health problem. Predominantly, referrals were to private practice psychologists and Headspace. Almost a third (31%) reported having limited understanding of ‘at-risk mental state’ and are ‘not always comfortable’ when facing a young person with a mental health problem. Nearly all (95%) expressed interest in attending specialised training. GPs identified treatment costs, scarce access to psychiatrists and limited patient engagement as the main obstacles to help young people. Conclusions: Effective treatment of a mental health problem relies on early identification. GPs are seeing young people on a regular basis but don’t feel well equipped for this task and are keen to up-skill, which needs to be addressed by targeted training.


BMJ Open ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 10 (11) ◽  
pp. e045235
Author(s):  
Felicity Waite ◽  
Thomas Kabir ◽  
Louise Johns ◽  
Jill Mollison ◽  
Apostolos Tsiachristas ◽  
...  

BackgroundEffective interventions, targeting key contributory causal factors, are needed to prevent the emergence of severe mental health problems in young people. Insomnia is a common clinical issue that is problematic in its own right but that also leads to the development and persistence of psychotic experiences. The implication is that treating sleep problems may prevent the onset of psychosis. We collected initial case series data with 12 young people at ultra-high-risk of psychosis. Post-intervention, there were improvements in sleep, depression and psychotic experiences. Now we test the feasibility of a randomised controlled trial, with a clinical aim to treat sleep problems and hence reduce depression, psychotic experiences, and prevent transition to psychosis.Methods and analysisA randomised controlled feasibility trial will be conducted. Forty patients aged 14 to 25 years who are at ultra-high-risk of psychosis and have sleep disturbance will be recruited from National Health Service (NHS) mental health services. Participants will be randomised to receive either a novel, targeted, youth-focussed sleep intervention in addition to usual care or usual care alone. Assessor-blinded assessments will be conducted at baseline, 3 months (post-intervention) and 9 months (follow-up). The eight-session psychological intervention will target the key mechanisms which disrupt sleep: circadian rhythm irregularities, low sleep pressure, and hyperarousal. To gain an in-depth understanding of participants’ views on the acceptability of the intervention and study procedures, 16 participants (n=10 intervention, n=6 control) will take part in qualitative interviews. Analyses will focus on feasibility outcomes (recruitment, retention, and treatment uptake rates) and provide initial CI estimates of intervention effects. Thematic analysis of the qualitative interviews will assess the acceptability of the intervention and trial procedures.Ethics and disseminationThe trial has received ethical approval from the NHS Health Research Authority. Findings will be disseminated through peer-reviewed publications, conference presentations, and lay networks.Trial registration numberISRCTN85601537.


Author(s):  
Albert Farre ◽  
Sara Ryan ◽  
Abigail McNiven ◽  
Janet E. McDonagh

Abstract Introduction Young people’s transition into adulthood is intertwined with the worlds of education and work. Poor health in adolescence has been associated with poorer education and employment outcomes in adulthood. This paper explores the impact of arthritis on the educational and early work experiences of young people with arthritis. Methods We undertook a supplementary secondary analysis of a qualitative dataset comprising narrative and semi-structured interviews of 39 young people who had been diagnosed with arthritis in childhood, adolescence or young adulthood. Results Our findings illustrate how young people living with arthritis are faced with a range of added disruptions and challenges in their educational/vocational lives. There is an important element of resilience associated with the process of making a career choice and acting upon personal aspirations. Appropriate support and flexibility in the workplace/educational setting can enable successful outcomes, but disclosure is not a straightforward process for young people living with arthritis. Conclusions It is paramount that health providers consistently and effectively address self-advocacy skills with the young person, particularly during educational and vocational transitions. Alongside this, there is the need to further strengthen the health-school/work interface to ensure that young people living with chronic illness can meet their full potential in adulthood.


Author(s):  
Heidi Moen Gjersøe ◽  
Anne Leseth

AbstractThis paper argues that young people, targeted by activation policies, had several temporal experiences with work that can contribute to broadening our understanding of labour market policy for this group of young people. By drawing on qualitative interviews with young people not in employment, education, or training (NEET) in a Norwegian activation context, and by applying anthropological and sociological concepts on temporality and work time in our analysis, we question how time is constructed and reproduced in the establishment of work relations among this group of people. We argue that political discourses of work inclusion for young adults (NEETs) tend to portray work as a means to an end for inclusion. In doing so, they fail to address the complex temporal dimension of work. We find that young adults have a range of complex experiences where disparity between formal and informal aspects of work becomes visible. The temporal dimension of these experiences and the relativity of speed in getting a job are not experienced in a linear manner but as churning between getting a job, having a job, and losing a job.


Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document