Urban African American High School Research Articles

Exploring African American Male Youth’s Perceptions of Community Involvement Through 4-H Programs

Civic engagement research suggests that youths’ involvement in their communities results in a number of positive personal and social attributes. However, among urban populations, there is still a dearth of research on their involvement and the impact of civic participation on their development. More importantly within these populations, there is limited understanding of how Black male youth engage within civic participatory spaces. Increasing but limited research on young Black male youth usually focuses on identity, participation in programs, and socioeconomic levels. Further understanding is needed as to the factors which influence and impact Black male youths’ interests and actual participation in community and extracurricular activities. This paper explores data from urban African American high school male youth that include their perceptions and knowledge and attitudes toward being involved in their community through 4-H youth programs. The authors find that opportunities to learn a new skill and building professional portfolios assist these young Black males in their perception of being effective in their communities and making a difference for themselves.

Mindfulness and Posttraumatic Stress Disorder Symptom Severity in Urban African-American High School Students.

The aim of the current study was to examine the relations among mindfulness, posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) symptom severity, and stressful life events (SLEs) in African-American urban adolescents. Another aim was to examine mindfulness as a moderator of the relation between SLEs and PTSD symptom severity in this population. Eighty-eight African-American high school students from a low-income urban community completed measures of demographics, PTSD symptom severity, SLEs, and mindfulness. Mindfulness was significantly negatively related to PTSD symptom severity, r(86) = -.70, p < .001, 95% CI [-.58, -79], and SLEs were significantly positively related to PTSD symptom severity, r(86) = .29, p = .003, 95% CI [.09, .47]. Mindfulness was an independent predictor of PTSD symptom severity after accounting for SLEs, B = -1.16, t(84) = -9.06, p < .001, 95% CI [-1.41, -0.90], and SLEs were an independent predictor of PTSD symptom severity after accounting for mindfulness, B = 0.49, t(84) = 2.92, p = .004, 95% CI [0.16, 0.82]. Mindfulness did not moderate the relation between SLEs and PTSD symptom severity, B = -.003, t(84) = -0.15, p = .89, 95% CI [-.04, .03]. This study has implications for both mindfulness as a potential protective factor against PTSD symptom severity and SLEs as a potential risk factor for increased PTSD symptom severity in African-American urban adolescents.

Rethinking the Notion of “Hostility” in African American Parenting Styles

African American parenting strategies are important in the development of prosocial behavior and are linked to empathy, self-efficacy, and racial identity. This study examined how adolescent-perceived parenting strategies (i.e., warmth, “hostility,” cultural socialization) combined to form parenting styles and how these related to positive outcomes. Participants were 358 low-income, urban southern African American high school students. Cluster analyses revealed four distinct parenting styles. Findings provide evidence that Eurocentric norms are inadequate for understanding socialization in African American families. Results indicate that a rethinking of what constitutes “parental hostility” is required. Implications, future research directions, and clinical application are discussed.

Authoring Student Voices on College Preparedness: A Case Study

ABSTRACTAfrican American students continue to attend college at much lower rates than their white, Asian, and Latino counterparts. Although researchers have examined this issue from a multitude of vantage points, the voices of students—particularly students of color—have been limited in this research. Using a counter-storytelling narrative approach, this study examines what urban African American high school students identify as the critical factors affecting their educational trajectory and college-going prospects. Findings from the current study reveal that students identified inadequate resources, tracking, lack of AP courses, and poor teachers as factors that influenced their high school to college transition. This study provides much needed insight into the discourse on school reform from the most important constituent in schools—the students.

Examining health literacy among urban African-American adolescents with asthma

Objective: This exploratory study assessed health literacy among urban African-American high school students to improve understanding of the association between adolescent health literacy and asthma. Methods: We conducted a secondary data analysis of the control group (n = 181) of the Puff City randomized controlled trial (2006–2010), a web-based intervention to promote asthma management among students, grades 9 through 12. A validated self-report 3-item health literacy screening instrument was completed at final online follow-up survey. Logistic regression was used to explore the association between health literacy, demographic characteristics, quality of life, asthma management, and health care utilization. Results: Multivariate analysis revealed that an overall inadequate health literacy score was associated with students who were more likely to be younger (OR 0.61; 95% CI 0.44–0.84), not on Medicaid (OR 0.36; 95% CI 0.17–0.76), have at least one hospitalization (OR 1.29; 95% CI 1.07–1.56); and a lower overall quality of life (OR 0.75; 95% CI 0.59–0.95). Those lacking confidence in filling out medical forms, needing help reading hospital materials, and having difficulty understanding written information were more likely to not have a rescue inhaler (OR 0.49; 95% CI 0.25–0.94), have one or more emergency visits (OR 1.21 95% CI 1.02–1.43), and one or more hospitalizations (OR 1.19; 95% CI 1.01–1.41), respectively. Conclusions: The findings indicate a significant association between inadequate health literary and suboptimal asthma management. It is important to advance understanding of adolescent health literacy, especially those at-risk, as they assume asthma self-management tasks and move toward independent adult self-care.

Problematizing the Discourse: A Quantitative Analysis of African American High School Students’ Academic Aspirations and Motivation to Excel

The influence of environmental and contextual factors on human development and behaviors among adolescents is well documented in the literature. The discourse surrounding urban African American high school students has largely failed to take into consideration how these factors relate to the postsecondary academic aspirations and motivations, performance, and success of these students. Stewart, Stewart, and Simons (2007) assessed the extent to which the neighborhood context predicts the college-going aspirations of African American youth and found that living in a disadvantaged neighborhood context lowers, albeit slightly, the college aspirations of this group. However, these authors fail to place these findings in a broader analysis of the relationship between aspirations and the contextual factors that impact on and manifest in the neighborhood context, particularly in low-income urban communities. Using an ecological perspective of development in this study, the authors carefully interrogate the relationship between urban African American high school students' academic aspirations and motivations regarding college and the various environmental and contextual factors that impact the communities, families, and peer networks of which they are a part. The work is situated within Bronfenbrenner's (1977 1994, 1999; Bronfenbrenner & Morris, 2006) model of human ecology, process-person-context-time (or PPCT). This ecological model centralizes the processes particular persons undergo within certain contexts and provides a framework for exploring how contexts ultimately facilitate or inhibit development over time.To date, ecological perspectives have been used extensively in studies on college students: academic success of first-generation ethnic minority students (Dennis, Phinney, & Chuateco, 2005); campus ecology (Dey & Hurtado, 1995); and, peer counseling and financial aid (Tierney & Venegas, 2006) to name a few. Additionally, studies on child development and social and emotional learning (Durlak et al., 2011), bullying and victimization (Cook et al., 2010), mentoring in the workplace (Chandler, Kram, & Yip, 2011), and classroom ecology and misbehavior (Supaporn, Dodds, & Griffin, 2003) have employed an ecological lens.The authors incorporate this theoretical lens in their work to interrogate the relationship between neoliberalism, school reform policies and practices, familial and social networks and the academic aspirations and motivations of urban African American high school students in California. The discussion of human ecology starts at the macrosystems level (e.g., neoliberalism) and at the exosystems level (e.g., current education reform policies and practices) to frame the context of urban communities in California. The quantitative analysis is limited to the microsystems level (e.g., family, peer and co-curricular determinants) where the authors assess the predictive relationship between these contextual factors and students' postsecondary academic aspirations and motivations.The aim of this study is to explore the extent to which family and social determinants, as well as co-curricular engagement, predict urban African American adolescents' personal determinants of academic success. For the purposes of this study, the authors conceptualize family determinants as the expectations a student's family has for him or her regarding secondary and postsecondary educational attainment, experiences with housing displacement, and low educational attainment among siblings. Furthermore, peer relationships, peer expectations and peer support in the schooling process is identified as positive peer support and more broadly, as a measure of social determinants. The outcome variable, personal determinants of academic success, is defined as a student's academic motivation, future aspirations, and personal expectations of academic success. The following questions guide this research:* What is the relationship between family determinants, co-curricular engagement, social determinants and urban African American students' personal determinants of academic success? …

Effects of an intellectually caring model on urban African American alternative high school students' conceptual change and achievement in chemistry

The purpose of this article is to study the effects of an intellectually caring model of teaching and learning on alternative African American high school students' conceptual change and achievement in a chemistry unit on acids and bases. A mixed-methods approach using retrospective data was utilized. Data secured from the teacher were the audio-recordings of her prior- and post-interventional individual interviews with students and the results of the students' pre- and post-interventional Acid Base Achievement Test (ABA-T). All audio-recorded interviews were transcribed. A qualitative analysis of students' prior- and post-interventional conceptions of acids and bases using phenomenography revealed: (a) a change in the number of categories of descriptions, (b) a shift in language use from everyday talk to more chemical talk, and (c) a hierarchy of chemical knowledge. The ABA-T results indicated that students (n = 17) in the experimental group achieved significantly higher scores (p < 0.003) than students in the control group (n = 22) taught by traditional teaching methods. The study outlines three implications: (a) reaching the often unreached mind, (b) developing simple chemical phrases into coherent chemical explanation, and (c) achieving alternative students' success in traditional test. The study recommends implementing an intellectually caring model for teaching alternative education students.

Achievement Goal Validation Among African American High School Students

Achievement goal theory helps describe how and why students engage in various academic behaviors. Historically, achievement goals have been examined almost exclusively with undergraduate, nonminority samples, and predominately with factor analytic techniques. The present study adds to a growing literature by providing initial validation of a leading achievement goal measure, the Achievement Goal Questionnaire-Revised (AGQ-R; Elliot &amp; Murayama, 2008), among rural ( N = 186) and urban ( N = 197) African American high school students. Collectively, results from both confirmatory factor and Rasch analyses highlight issues that should be considered when using the AGQ-R among African American high school students.

The Relations of Stressful Events and Nonacademic Future Expectations in African American Adolescents: Gender Differences in Parental Monitoring

Urban African American high school students (N = 206) completed a study to examine gender differences in parental monitoring and the effect on the relationship between exposure to stressful life events and nonacademic future expectations. Participant's ages range from 13 to 18 (M = 15.78, SD = 1.19). Participants reported high exposure to stressful life events, but also high future expectations. Older girls reported the highest levels of parental monitoring. Parental monitoring showed a moderating effect on the future expectations only for African American adolescent males, who were exposed to a high number of stressful life events. This finding seems to suggest that while older African American adolescent females report the highest levels of parental monitoring, the construct has more of an impact on outcomes for males.Keywords: gender differences, stressful events, parental monitoring, future expectations, African American adolescentsAdolescence is a difficult and stressful time in the lives of youths regardless of gender, race, and background. Along with the normal trials associated with puberty, adolescence may be more challenging for ethnic and minority youth (Garcia Coll et al., 1996). Racial and ethnic minority families tend to reside in urban neighborhoods, which are often characterized by many challenges to academic success and good psychological, cognitive, social, and physical development (Leventhal & Brooks-Gunn, 2000). However, living in an urban environment does not automatically lead to negative outcomes. Parents often buffer adolescents' experiences. In particular, parental monitoring plays significant roles for most adolescents (Spencer, Dupree, Swanson, & Cunningham, 1996, 1998).PARENTAL MONITORINGParents play important roles in the lives of adolescents, and it is no secret that parents hold very different views about sons and daughters. It has also been shown that as early as 3 -years old, parents pressure their children into appropriate sex-typed play (Eisenberg, Wolchik, Hernandez, & Pasternack, 1985). Studies reveal that parents use rewards and punishments differently for boys and girls for appropriate play (Eisenberg et al, 1985). It is important to understand this gender-based differential treatment of boys and girls in early childhood to have a more holistic view of its consequences in adolescence. This point is especially true for African American adolescents. Mandara, Murray, and Joyner (2005) demonstrated in one study how a father's absence or presence differentially affects African American girls and boys. In particular, they found that African American father-absent boys reported lower levels of masculinity (e.g., self-defined traditional notions of maleness as assessed on a scale of Adjective Q-sort of ideal masculine to ideal feminine) than African American father-present boys. The same study showed that lower income African American father-absent girls reported the highest levels of current masculinity of all African American girl participants (Mandara et al., 2005). These findings demonstrate how fathers differentially socialize boys and girls based on gender, and that girls are encouraged by dads to be more feminine and boys to be more masculine. Therefore, this study demonstrates how parenting strategies, and parental monitoring in particular, becomes more salient and meaningful for African American adolescents.In adolescence, one area where gender-based differences become important is in the levels of parental monitoring (Hamza & Willoughby, 2011; Spencer et al., 1996, 1998). Parental monitoring is defined as parents' knowledge, supervision, and control of their children's daily activities and peer relationships in an attempt to minimize the potential risks to which their children are exposed (Cottrell et al., 2003; Hamza & Willoughby, 2011; Spencer et al., 1996, 1998). For example, families that show moderate to high parental monitoring may include parents that are familiar with their children's friends, extracurricular activities, and express concern about where their children spend time away from home and school (Spencer et al. …

School Attendance Revisited

Urban African American first-year high school students' absenteeism was found to be negatively related to grade point average (GPA) and avoidance as a means of coping (use of substances as a way to escape—food, alcohol, smoking, caffeine, etc.) and positively related to use of social support as a means of coping (efforts to stay emotionally connected with people through reciprocal problem solving and expression of affect). Nonattenders tend to have lower GPAs, report using avoidance less often as a means of coping, and report using social support more often. In other words, those students who attend school most frequently tend to have higher GPAs, use avoidance more often as a means of coping, and use members of their social support less often than do those who have more absences. Implications are discussed for educational reform, school counseling service delivery, and future research.

Factors Affecting Urban African American High School Students' Achievement in Reading

Data analyzed from the Educational Longitudinal Study of 2002 indicate that the reading achievement of urban African American high school students is positively influenced by the amount of hours spent doing homework and by parents' expectations of their child's future educational attainment. Implications for practice and research are provided.

A Web-based, Tailored Asthma Management Program for Urban African-American High School Students

A Web-based, Tailored Asthma Management Program for Urban African-American High School Students

A web-based, tailored asthma management program for urban African-American high school students.

Urban African-American youth, aged 15-19 years, have asthma fatality rates that are higher than in whites and younger children, yet few programs target this population. Traditionally, urban youth are believed to be difficult to engage in health-related programs, both in terms of connecting and convincing. Develop and evaluate a multimedia, web-based asthma management program to specifically target urban high school students. The program uses "tailoring," in conjunction with theory-based models, to alter behavior through individualized health messages based on the user's beliefs, attitudes, and personal barriers to change. High school students reporting asthma symptoms were randomized to receive the tailored program (treatment) or to access generic asthma websites (control). The program was made available on school computers. Functional status and medical care use were measured at study initiation and 12 months postbaseline, as were selected management behaviors. The intervention period was 180 days (calculated from baseline). A total of 314 students were randomized (98% African American, 49% Medicaid enrollees; mean age, 15.2 yr). At 12 months, treatment students reported fewer symptom-days, symptom-nights, school days missed, restricted-activity days, and hospitalizations for asthma when compared with control students; adjusted relative risk and 95% confidence intervals were as follows: 0.5 (0.4-0.8), p = 0.003; 0.4 (0.2-0.8), p = 0.009; 0.3 (0.1-0.7), p = 0.006; 0.5 (0.3-0.8), p = 0.02; and 0.2 (0.2-0.9), p = 0.01, respectively. Positive behaviors were more frequently noted among treatment students compared with control students. Cost estimates for program delivery were $6.66 per participating treatment group student. A web-based, tailored approach to changing negative asthma management behaviors is economical, feasible, and effective in improving asthma outcomes in a traditionally hard-to-reach population.

The Relationship of Career Decision-Making Self-Efficacy, Vocational Identity, and Career Exploration Behavior in African American High School Students

This study explores the relationship between the social cognitive construct of career decision-making self-efficacy and the outcome variables of vocational identity and career exploration behaviors in a sample of 72 urban African American high school students. The results indicate that higher levels of career decision-making self-efficacy are related to both a more differentiated vocational self-concept and to greater engagement with career exploration activities. Implications for career guidance and future research are discussed.

This Test is Unfair

This qualitative study explored the perceptions of, knowledge regarding, and preparation for standardized college admissions exams of 227 urban African American and Latino high school students. Findings include the students’lack of information about the test and their reliance on their relatively uninformed and unavailable school officials for information, preparation strategies, strategies for achieving high scores, stress level due to the necessity of high test scores, and beliefs that the tests are an unfair obstacle. Students’knowledge of and strategies for preparing and taking the tests are conceptualized as cultural capital and habitus utilizing a Bourdieuian framework.

Helping Urban African American High School Students to Excel Academically: The Roles of School Counselors

This article focuses on systemic conceptualizations that attempt to explicate why academic achievement may be challenging for some urban African American high school students. In addition, the author delineates the important roles that high school counselors can play in ensuring urban African American high school students' academic success.

Urban Adolescents' Personality and Learning Styles: Required Knowledge to Develop Effective Interventions in Schools

Researchers identified personality typologies (Myers‐Briggs Type Indicator; Myers, 1962) among urban African American high school Juniors and seniors (n = 173). Introverted Sensing Thinking Judging (ISTJ) and the Introverted Sensing Thinking Perceptive (ISTP) were the two most represented typologies. Implications for school counselors, teachers, and teacher and counselor educators are discussed.

Psychological Adjustment and Coping Styles of Urban African American High School Students

In a study of African American (n = 208) urban high school students, grade point average (GPA) and specific strategies for coping with day‐to‐day stressors were found to be significantly related to psychological adjustment. Students who had higher GPAs tended to use family members as a means of solving problems, minimized problems by the use of humor, and used relaxation activities less often were found to have the most positive psychological adjustment, as measured by the index score of the Affects Balance Scale (ABS). Reported negative affect was not found to be significantly influenced by coping style, whereas positive affect was.