Youth Voice Research Articles

Facing power: navigating power dynamics in a youth participatory action research project situated within a healthcare setting

ABSTRACT Youth Participatory Action Research (YPAR) is oftentimes cited as a method guided by social justice principles to uplift youth voice and pursue youth priorities in research. However, to uphold these principles, YPAR researchers must address how youth and adults alike negotiate power differentials to be equal partners in research and scholarship. We explore YPAR power sharing through a reflexive thematic analysis of in-depth, semi-structured interviews (n = 42) and focus groups (n = 2) conducted at three timepoints (baseline, mid-point, and exit) with youth (n = 8) and adult (n = 6) researchers engaged in a YPAR exploring health equity at a large, safety-net hospital. Our analyses suggest that both youth and adult researchers negotiate power dynamics in a YPAR at every stage of the project. YPAR researchers made four recommendations to negotiate power: 1) preserve time for relationship building, 2) structure group expectations, 3) require training for adults working with youth of color, and 4) designate youth-only spaces. This study provides an in-depth analysis of youth and adult reflections on power across a YPAR project. Our findings indicate that YPAR requires significant investment in resources, including time to reflect on and process power, transparent and structured expectations, and ongoing training to uphold principles of YPAR.

An interdisciplinary framework of youth participatory action research informed by curricula, youth, adults, and researchers.

Rarely are youth voices incorporated into program and policy development. Youth participatory action research (YPAR) is an opportunity for adolescents to develop research skills by completing projects relevant to their lives and allows participation and decision-making at systems and organizational levels. Attention to YPAR implementation detail, especially a curricular focus, is lacking in the literature. Specifically absent is an all-encompassing YPAR framework, a gap the current study addresses. The current study includes a review of existing YPAR curricula to develop the Youth Researcher Empowerment Framework, including research components, social emotional competencies, and assumptions necessary for completing a YPAR project that centers youth voice and shared power. The study includes a quantitative assessment of the YPAR curricula and qualitative reviews by adult practitioners. In addition, focus group data from youth and teacher audiences across multiple settings confirmed and clarified terms and concepts related to the framework. The study provides empirical evidence to support a revised framework for YPAR curricular implementation. Implications are discussed in terms of aspects of the research process needed for YPAR projects, attention to specific youth developmental skills as outcomes, and underlying principles needed to create a welcoming, contextual space allowing for empowerment, youth voice, and choice.

Employing a Youth Internship Model to Identify Goals to Reduce Barriers to Active Living.

Active lifestyles are vital for promoting health. In this practice note, we describe the implementation of an active living intervention designed to engage youth in identifying barriers to being physically active and developing recommendations to address these barriers. Youth interns were compensated for their time. Through this project, the community obtained street striping for the first time, secured a community center when the police substation building was turned over to the community, and had sidewalk funding prioritized for one of their busiest streets. Lessons learned while developing and implementing this youth internship program focused on making the internship program work well given youth schedules and focusing on supporting the voice of youth to advocate for changes to the built environment in an intentionally excluded community.

Empowering Youths for Social Changes: Educational Initiatives in Gandaki Rural Municipality, Ward No. 6

The study aims to discern the role of education on youth empowerment to promote health and sanitation, gender equality and awareness to address social issues for social changes in Gandaki Rural Municipality ward number 6. The survey study identified various challenges related to education for youth empowerment. The descriptive research design was used. The focused group discussions using semi-structured questionnaires were administered to the seven youths of Chepang/Praja community aged 15-19 years old residing in the ward number 6. The sample was selected using purposive sampling technique. The education the youth of Chepang/Praja community empowered through education demonstrated the ability to promotes health and sanitation, gender equality and create awareness to address social issues within their society. Major challenges identified includes reluctance to change by the senior citizens, lack of priority to the training that didn't provide allowances, the voices of youth are unheard, remote geographical location, lack the access to transportation, lacks appropriate resources and migration. The study suggested that the education brings positive social changes through empowering the youth in the promotion of health and sanitation, gender equality and creation of awareness to address the social changes.

Surveying adult support for child and youth voice on environmental governmental decision-making in Australia and New Zealand

The global movement of student strikes for climate action illustrates that many children and youth want to have a voice on governmental decisions on the environment. Yet in most nations, an electoral voice is not granted to those under the age of 18. From prior research, we see the main barrier for child and youth voice to parliament is adult attitudes towards children and youth. To find out who supports their voice on government decisions for the environment, we added such a question to the Australia and New Zealand iterations of the International Social Survey Program 2020 survey. The results indicated that the majority of surveyed adults support 11–14 year olds (Aus 62 %, NZ 59 %) and 15–18 year olds (Aus 79 %, NZ 80 %) having opportunities to influence government decisions on the environment. Analysis of responses to this question in relation to demographic survey data indicated variations in preferences for different age groups of children and youth, and that age, gender, education, concern for the environment, environment organisation membership and prior election political party preference of respondents were variables of significance for both nations. Recommendations for policy and practice to broaden support for child and youth voice to contribute to government decisions on the environment are suggested with application of Iris Marion Young’s propositions for more inclusive democracy.

Promoting good trouble: Latinx youth-driven change strategies for civic engagement and activism

Civic engagement can help adolescents recognize, evaluate, and act to challenge injustice, oppression, and institutionalized racism. However, systemic oppression that silences minoritized youth voice and activism can thwart civic engagement, disrupting positive youth development pathways. Building from a larger community-based participatory research study using qualitative, youth-led focus group methods, we prioritize youth voice to explore change strategies Latinx youth ages 14–18 in Houston and Denver identify as beneficial to challenging barriers to civic engagement and supporting their civic empowerment. Analyses yielded specific Latinx youth-identified strategies and foundational principles responding directly to barriers and oppressive systems within distinct ecological contexts in youth’s lives. Findings inform tailored efforts to support Latinx youth in pursuing civic action and challenging oppressive systems.

Perspectives of South Asian Youth in the United States about Gender Norms and Healthcare Decision Making

Abstract The aim of this study was to explore the voices of South Asian youth in the United States about gender norms and healthcare decision making. Ten focus group discussions were held with 36 students of South Asian origin at a university on the West Coast of the United States. Thematic analysis was performed on the focus group data. Three main themes emerged from the data: (1) intersectionality of gender with other factors that affect healthcare decision making, (2) impact of gender on health, and (3) coping strategies. Participants reported preferential treatment for boys versus girls, vesting decision-making control among males, worse health among females, and coping strategies. A few responses indicated that power differentials in some families were shifting to a more egalitarian balance between males and females. Aspects such as age, employment, and language barriers intersected with gender to create a complex web of influence on healthcare decision making. The study has implications for social workers to offer culturally responsive support to South Asian youth in the United States, paying attention to the intersectionalities when working with them. Further research is needed to explore the influence of gender on healthcare decision-making processes of South Asian youth in the United States.

Keeping young researchers out of harm's way: conducting youth participatory action research with young people experiencing homelessness.

Youth Participatory Action Research (YPAR) is an approach to conducting research with youth populations in order to effectively engage youth in research that impacts their lives. Young people experiencing homelessness (YEH) are vulnerable to power and social environments in ways that call attention to their experiences in research. The context for this paper was a qualitative YPAR project to incorporate youth voice into the operations of a larger research study that hired youth as researchers. Participant-researchers provided feedback and consultation with senior staff in order to improve their access to resources, safety, and stability. Themes that emerged from thematic analysis of reflections, discussions, and meetings showed the need for consistent access to food, the risk of environmental violence targeting youth researchers, the structural and experiential barriers to professional engagement, and the benefits that young researchers experienced as part of their work in the study. Recommendations and lessons learned are described, notably to ensure that youth are paid and provided food, to construct effective safety plans during fieldwork, and to provide a flexible, inclusive, trauma-responsive approach to supervision of project tasks.

Risks and challenges of living in Institutions: Voices from young people with care experience in China

Amid global shifts towards family-based alternatives, China persists with prevalent institutional care, drawing attention to concerns surrounding caregiving practices. Official data indicates a substantial population, approximately 27.36% of all childcare recipients, living in state-funded care institutions, prompting an exploration of the risks factors faced by these young individuals. This study focuses on exploring risk factors of living in institutions, providing a unique perspective often absent in existing literature—the voices of the care-experienced youth themselves. It included 34 young people who had lived experiences in institutional care. Participants were interviewed to gather their experiences of living in care. Thematic analysis reveals that the overriding risk factors during young people’s living in care range from care identity and parental absence to substandard living conditions, unqualified caregiving, excessive domestic responsibilities, institutional neglect of education, environmental instability, and physical impairments. These challenges contribute to unfavourable outcomes during the transition to adulthood. Therefore, this study concludes that institutional care is suboptimal for children and young individuals in need of genuine care. Based on the findings, practical implications are provided for policymakers and practitioners to make improvements. Nonetheless, ongoing research is essential to contextualise care experiences within current policies, ensuring lessons from historical accounts guide future efforts to enhance the lives of young people in care.

Sexual and gender minoritized youth on the impact of a community-based program

This study uses qualitative interviews to explore the perceptions of sexual and gender minoritized youth on the impact of a sexual and gender minoritized–specific community-based youth program in Ontario, Canada: The Open Doors drop-in program. Thematic analysis revealed that Open Doors created feelings of safety, social connectedness, and empowerment, and also provided youth with tools and resources for building capacity and exercising resilience. Youth felt that they were afforded experiences in Open Doors that they did not have elsewhere. The findings of this research have important implications for centering youth voices and experiences in sexual and gender minoritized–specific community-based programs in both practice and research.

Improving equity in diabetes technology use: Voices of youth and their parents.

There are marked inequities in clinical outcomes and rates of diabetes technology use among youth with type 1 diabetes (T1D). The quantitative data from our mixed methods cohort study identified significant improvements in glycaemia and quality of life in participants. We aimed to use qualitative methods to provide further insight into our quantitative findings in the setting of underlying health disparities. Fifteen publicly insured, insulin pump-naïve non-Hispanic Black youth aged 6-21 years with T1D and baseline haemoglobin A1c (HbA1c) ≥86 mmol/mol (10%) and their parents participated in a mixed methods cohort study. Semi-structured interviews were conducted separately with parents and youth after completion of 6 months of HCL use. Three topic areas were explored: (1) Experience using HCL, (2) barriers to HCL and (3) facilitators to accessing HCL. Semantic content analysis and consensus coding involving two team members were used to generate themes. Thematic saturation was achieved. Youth (Medianage 14.9 years, 67% female) and parents (92% female) were interviewed. Youth and their parents reported that access to HCL provides a new outlook on living with T1D, although managing T1D is still hard. They felt that diabetes technology is most helpful for those struggling with management. Participants experienced barriers to access including misconceptions of HCL systems, clinician bias and systemic racism. They suggested these barriers can be overcome by offering diabetes technology education for all people with T1D, increasing awareness of HCL in the community and providing resources to overcome barriers created by social determinants of health. The voices of historically minoritised youth with suboptimal T1D control and their parents provide important, previously unreported experiences and perspectives on barriers and facilitators to using HCL that will shape interventions to improve equity in access to diabetes technology.

Doesn’t Matter If You Stopped Me, I’ve Still Got to Chase My Dream: Tibetan Youth in NSW Navigate Racism and Intergenerational Differences

ABSTRACT Racism and discrimination, family disjuncture and differential experiences depending on migration experiences influence resettlement in new environments and sense of belonging. This article focuses on a little-known group in Australia – Tibetan youth. This article centres the voices of Tibetan refugee youth in the state of New South Wales seeking to understand, from their frame of reference, how they establish networks and social relations in the context of racism and intergenerational differences. ‘Refugee youth’ can imply homogenised experiences, yet intersections such as ethnicity, culture, religion, gender and more shape diverse experiences. This article also shows the importance of responsive not-for-profit organisations in filling the welcome gap that is not apparent in the wider society.

Youth voice finds a new home

National Youth Agency steps up to run the UK Youth Parliament after collapse of previous host body

“We got to stand up and speak”: Youth in high-poverty, high-crime urban communities of color reflect on their cross-age mentoring program

This project draws from youth voices to develop theory about outcomes and change mechanisms in a cross-age mentoring out of school program with urban African American and Latine youth living in low-income communities. With instructors’ supports, African American and Latine mentors (N = 148, ages 14–20) in four U.S. urban, high-poverty communities of color mentored children weekly for an average of 16 sessions, followed by a debriefing session. Researchers used qualitative, participatory methods to elicit mentor perspectives about what made their program impactful. Diverse qualitative data were collected by staff and youth and analyzed thematically. Outcomes adolescent mentors deemed meaningful were 1) developing good character, specifically persistence, leadership and listening skills, patience, respectful collaborations, goal-oriented hopefulness, and more positive racial identities, and 2) building trustworthy, supportive relationships with mentees, peers, and instructors. Mechanisms mentors regarded as generating outcomes were 1) being active agents in program implementation and evaluation, and also contributing knowledge about themselves, and 2) the fulfillment of caring for community children, which youth regarded as a partial remedy for deprivations and injustices their communities experience. Differences in emphasis based on gender are described. Outcomes and generative mechanisms are discussed in relation to youths’ community cultural wealth. Comprehensively empowering youth to co-lead program development, implementation, evaluation and theorizing can improve the fidelity of scientific knowledge to youths’ strengths and priorities, and yield theories of intervention consonant with youths’ cultural wealth.

Attune, animate and amplify: Creating youth voice assemblages in pARTicipatory sexuality education research

AbstractThis paper explores the politics and praxis of ‘youth voice assemblages’ in an exploratory and pARTicipatory research project where 125 young people (aged 11–18) from England, Scotland and Wales shared what and how they are learning about relationships, sex and sexuality. Creative methods enabled us to ‘attune’ to this learning and generate ‘darta’ (arts‐based data). We then ‘animated’ these darta as dartaphacts (creative objects) including films, poetry and education cards. Finally, we ‘amplified’ these dartaphacts in a face‐to‐face launch event. We argue that a creative ontology of ‘youth voice’ is imperative to develop more relevant, responsive and ethical sexuality and relationships education.

Amplifying Youth Voices: Redefining Qualitative Research with Child and Adolescent Co-Researchers

ABSTRACT In youth research, children are the main stakeholder, but researchers have historically relied on adult data sources to convey the lived experiences of youth. Over the past few years, there has been a stronger call for ethical considerations in child research, including how to best capture youth voices. Due to the developmental differences between children and adults, however, it is crucial for qualitative researchers to choose measures that are appropriate for the co-researchers involved and implement trustworthiness checks that directly include those being investigated. In this article, we aim to support the qualitative inquiry process for counseling researchers working with children and adolescents (ages 3 to 17). We summarize qualitative designs that empower youth voices, as well as evidence-based youth interviewing strategies, such as drawing and play-based approaches that can be utilized within these designs. Lastly, we discuss methodological challenges and possible solutions throughout.

Youth Mental Health in the Digital Age: Canadian Youth Perspectives on the Relationship Between Digital Technology and Their Mental Health

ABSTRACT New generations of youth are coming of age at a time when digital technology is omnipresent, and ever-evolving. It is not yet fully appreciated what effect this level of digital technology use will have on current and future generations. Although not entirely negative, dramatic shifts in human interaction and well-being have already presented themselves. Among these shifts are rising rates of youth struggling with mental health–especially since the COVID-19 pandemic. In this study, we explore youth perspectives on the relationship between their digital technology and their mental health, through the use of semi-structured interviews and thematic analysis. Our research question was: How do youth understand the relationship between digital technology use and their mental health? We interviewed eight adolescents and asked them to share their experiences of the relationship between their devices and their well-being. Thematic findings highlight a conflictual relationship between digital technology use and youth mental health, affecting their relationships with others, themselves, and the world around them. Because digital technology consumption on this scale is so new, our sample represents one of the first available cohorts of youth to actively participate in the exploration of this topic. Implications include the need for further qualitative research to prioritize youth voices in ways that will benefit broader societal understandings of technology and mental health.

British Youth Council: five factors for demise of youth voice stalwart

The British Youth Council had been at the forefront of the youth movement for 75 years, but in recent times was unable to weather a perfect storm of internal and external pressures that led to it becoming unsustainable

“We Can Transform This, We Can Change This”: Adolescent Sociopolitical Development as a Catalyst for Healthy Life-Span Development

In the late 1970s, adolescents in East Harlem, New York, participated in a program called the Youth Action Program where they worked collectively to address systemic issues causing inequities in their communities (e.g., inequities in housing and education). In the current study, we integrate the sociopolitical development framework with life-course health development to explore how participation in the program shaped adolescents’ skills and capacities for social transformation in ways that were health-promotive and informative for life trajectories. Data included retrospective interviews and member-checking focus group data of 10 former Youth Action Program members (current Mage = 63; 45% female; 55% male) from predominantly Black and Latinx backgrounds. We used reflexive thematic analysis and adopted a case study approach to highlight how participants’ adolescent experiences of sociopolitical development and resistance against oppressive circumstances propelled healthy life-course development. Specifically, participants were able to establish healthy lives through four health-promotive sociopolitical developmental processes: questioning the system not the self; carving out alternative spaces and pathways; building agency in a dehumanizing society; and finding purpose through committing to social change. Our study suggests that contemporary youth organizing programs can incorporate sustaining practices including the careful vetting and training of adult staff, pursuing tangible opportunities to create change, and embedding youth voice and leadership into programmatic structures to encourage healthy development via sociopolitical development.

A Call for Youth Voice to Support Engagement in Care for 18- to 29-Year Olds Living with HIV in the US South.

Youth with HIV (YWH) face challenges in achieving viral suppression, particularly in the Southern United States, and welcome novel interventions responsive to community needs. The Theory of Planned Behavior (TPB) describes factors that influence behavior change, and the Positive Youth Development (PYD) supports youth-focused program design. We applied TPB and PYD to explore factors supporting care engagement and challenges for YWH in South Texas. We conducted 14 semi-structured interviews with YWH and 7 focus groups with 26 stakeholders informed by TPB, PYD, and themes from a youth advisory board (YAB). The research team and YAB reviewed emerging themes, and feedback-aided iterative revision of interview guides and codebook. Thematic analysis compared code families by respondent type, TPB, and PYD. All study methods were reviewed by the UT Health San Antonio and University Health Institutional Review Boards. Emerging themes associated with care engagement included: varied reactions to HIV diagnosis from acceptance to fear/grief; financial, insurance, and mental health challenges; history of trauma; high self-efficacy; desire for independence; and desire for engagement with clinic staff from their age group. Stakeholders perceived YWH lifestyle, including partying and substance use, as care barriers. In contrast, YWH viewed "partying" as an unwelcome stereotype, and barriers to care included multiple jobs and family responsibilities. Two key themes captured in PYD but not in TPB were the importance of youth voice in program design and structural barriers to care (e.g., insurance, transportation). Based on these findings, we provide critical and relevant guidance for those seeking to design more effective youth-centered HIV care engagement interventions. By considering the perspectives of YWH in program design and incorporating the PYD framework, stakeholders can better align with YWHs' desire for representation and agency. Our findings provide important and relevant guidance for those seeking to design more effective HIV care engagement interventions for YWH.