- Email: [email protected]
It's 2009: Do you know where your teenager is?
Journal of Applied Developmental Psychology 30 (2009) 645–647
Contents lists available at ScienceDirect
Journal of Applied Developmental Psychology
Book review
It's 2009: Do you know where your teenager is? Peter L. Benson, Sparks: How parents can help ignite the hidden strengths of teenagers. Jossey-Bass, San Francisco, 2008, ISBN: 978-0-470-29404-8 (cloth), 235 pages, $24.95 William Damon, The path to purpose: How young people find their calling in life. Free Press, New York, 2008, ISBN: 978-1-41653724-3 (paper), 217 pp., $15.00 Richard M. Lerner, The good teen: Rescuing adolescence from the myths of the storm and stress years. Three Rivers Press (A Stonesong Press Book), New York, 2007, ISBN: 978-0-307-34758-9 (paper), 257 pp., $14.95 Parenting a teenager is no easy task in today's world. Evidence for this statement can be found in the sizeable number of public service announcements (PSAs) about parenting teens—keeping track of their whereabouts, talking to them about sex, warning them about drugs, and so forth. These three books, intended for parents, practitioners, and other members of a lay audience, aim to ease the job. They offer advice and guidance on the nature of contemporary adolescents, their needs, and how parents, teachers and others may contribute to their positive development. Having been concerned throughout my career with using research from developmental science to influence policy for children, youth and families, I have always been interested in dissemination. Most scientists recognize the need to disseminate their research to those who have power over science funding and policy (Huston, 2008). Few have responded, however, to the need to bring their expertise to the public to help them with their tasks of daily living such as parenting. One of my pet peeves has been that when I enter a bookstore and look across the shelves of psychology books, I rarely recognize the name of an author who is a respected research scientist. These three books are welcome exceptions. Each author is a scholarly authority on adolescent development, and in these books they offer their expertise and wisdom to the public, translating that expertise into “how to” advice for parents and others concerned with teenagers. I would highly recommend any or all of these books to any parent of a teenager, to anyone who works with teens, or to anyone with an interest in adolescence. The three books share the important common theme of adopting a positive perspective on adolescence. Benson discusses “sparks,” which he defines as hidden strengths, and offers advice for parents on identifying and nourishing sparks. Damon focuses on purpose, the adolescent quest to find it, and how parents and others can help. Lerner, following a positive youth development (PYD) approach, which has also been important in guiding research and policy in recent years, debunks the idea that adolescence is necessarily a turbulent time of “stress and storm” because of the significant and varied changes that ensue. This positive perspective on adolescents is sorely needed at a time when most adults view teenagers negatively. Not only does the public have a negative view of youth, but it is virtually impossible to combat those views with examples of positive contributions by teens (Gilliam & Bales, 2001). Advising parents and others of the positive side of adolescence and describing how they can promote further positive development is hence both unique and quite needed. Peter Benson's work at the Search Institute is in many ways responsible for the current positive youth development approach to research and policy on adolescence and youth. Although the original formulation has undergone considerable revision as research has continued, the idea that individuals and communities hold assets which are the keys to positive development still represents an important contribution. Sparks hold many similarities to assets. Sparks are “hidden flames” that originate in the gut, that can represent any area, that get youth going on a positive path, and help them develop a life purpose (in this way he connects to Damon's thesis). Sparks are what makes the teen want to get out of bed in the morning. Benson begins his book by justifying the need for attention to sparks because of the many and varied challenges confronting today's young people. These challenges include: the overwhelming nature of the technological revolution that tends to separate teens from their parental generation, increasing globalization and diversity (including the growing gap between the rich and the poor), the expectation and need for quick results, sexual overexposure, the threat of terrorism and other political events that succeeded the September 11, 2001 attacks, the stress associated with the intensity of family schedules, and parents' expressed fears for their children's safety. Recognizing one's sparks helps teens deal with these challenges. It is the parents' job to help their doi:10.1016/j.appdev.2009.07.004
646
Book review
adolescent recognize his/her sparks. This means helping the youth realize that there is something good and special about them, and that they are a person of worth and value to the world. Sparks work similarly to assets in that they relate to many of the same positive outcomes as assets, such as good academic performance and high self esteem. The first part of the book presents the intellectual argument for sparks and the latter half offers advice to parents on how to recognize and nourish sparks. There are five steps: recognize the power of sparks, know your teenager, help discover and reveal their sparks, be captain of your teen's spark team, and keep the spark lit. This section of the book contains much useful specific advice for parents: for example, how to deal with your teen wanting to drop out of something you think is important. The section is also peppered with individual examples based on interviews with adolescents. The next section then offers more detailed examples, “Stories from across America on the road to a hopeful future.” Here Benson introduces the PYD idea of thriving, and describes the importance of thriving youth to a thriving nation. He offers support for his thesis on sparks and thriving from a variety of other youth leaders and ends with a very valuable directory of resources. His book is in these ways the most user-friendly of the three. The path to purpose is Bill Damon's third book on adolescent development. All three reflect his background in moral development; here he focuses on purpose. A purpose is a deeper reason for the motivation and goals that drive daily behavior. “A purpose can organize an entire life, imparting not only meaning but also inspiration and motivation for ongoing learning and achievement (pg 23).” But a purpose contributes not only to individual development but also to the larger society in which the individual lives, hence the connection to moral development. He uses the phrase “noble purpose” often. Work, religion, family, politics, art, sports are all important sources for purpose, but the adolescent often needs help in finding a “calling” through these outlets. In fact, he argues that family is the most important source. Damon relies on research in developmental psychology and positive psychology to justify his concern for the importance of purpose. He then reports a study of 400 young people. Using surveys, interviews, and case studies, Damon explores the role of purpose in the lives of today's adolescents. From this work, he defines four groups of teens: the disengaged, the dreamers, the dabblers, and the purposeful. The names aptly define the groups. He finds roughly equal numbers in each group, a bit less (20%) in purposeful and a few more in dabblers (31%). He selects a group of the most purposeful and studies them in detail. These profiles of young people who have made a commitment to a noble cause are the highlight of the book for me; the chapter is short and I would have loved to see more. Finally Damon offers recommendations for how significant others such as parents and teachers can help youth find their purpose. He offers nine rather specific suggestions for having a positive impact on a teen's search for purpose; these include listen carefully, support interests, and open dialogues. He argues that our focus on “short horizons” is the greatest barrier to youth finding purpose and sees parents as one of the main forces that can combat this focus on short horizons so prevalent in the media and popular culture. In the final chapter, he discusses what I consider to be the biggest challenge of parenting. He describes the parenting paradox that youth need to find their own purpose but they cannot do so without the advice and assistance of parents and other significant others in their lives. Hence successful parenting involves finding the right balance of freedom and guidance. Damon's Path to purpose necessarily shares numerous similarities with Benson's thesis. It is concerned with positive development and he uses that literature as the basis for his argument. He also collects information on contemporary youth, and this information is amongst the most interesting parts of the book. He also alludes to “sparks,” advising parents to listen closely for a spark and then fan its flame. His goal for youth is also to promote “thriving.” The tagline on Lerner's The good teen is “Groundbreaking research reveals everything you think you know about teens is wrong.” This reveals the two most important features of this book. Of the three books, it is the most based in the now extensive research literature on adolescent development, and hence it is the most academic even though it does not present original data as the other two do. It also portrays current adolescence in a positive light; adolescence is not only positive if we do the right things. He supports this point by describing Mark Twain's Huckleberry Finn and Tom Sawyer as metaphors for all teens; these boys showed problems, as do all youth, but the trouble they got into did not define who they were. Lerner offers an almost autobiographical description of his research career that led to the development of the ideas presented in this book. He uses his own research as well as that of others to support the theory. One study with Carl Taylor included members of youth gangs from Detroit. He reports feeling surprise that many of these youth showed evidence of positive development despite all odds being against them. The reason is that they found developmental assets in their environment of which they were able to take advantage to develop one or more of the five Cs that constitute positive development. Lerner then describes the five Cs that represent the basic tenets of the theory, the building blocks of positive development. They are: Competence, Confidence, Connection, Character, and Caring. A sixth C, Contribution, emerges from the first five. After summarizing his argument that adolescence is represented by positive development, not storm and stress, he devotes a chapter to each of the 6 Cs. These chapters offer how-to advice for parents on how to nourish development of the 6 Cs. He describes three key elements of parenting that promote the development of the Cs: Teens need sustained positive interaction with adults; teens need to participate in structured activities that enable them to develop life skills; teens should become leaders of valued community activities. In the 6th C chapter, he offers a useful recap in a two-page table of ways to build strengths and develop the Cs. He later acknowledges that real problems can arise and offers advice on how to cope with these challenges. In the final chapter, he issues a call to arms for the nation by describing this country's need for a national youth policy. He makes the important point that parents cannot just worry about their own children; we all need to be concerned with all our youth if the nation is to thrive. Finally, he also offers an extensive reference list but one probably more conducive to uses by an academic audience. Although somewhat more academic than the other two books because of the extensive reliance on the research literature, this book offers a wealth of valuable information for parents.
Book review
647
It is not easy to find fault with these books. If I were to offer a criticism of all three, it is that they do not sufficiently acknowledge that there in fact are negative aspects to adolescence with which parents have to cope. My daughter was an easy pleasant baby and child, and she is now a charming young adult. However, adolescence was in fact a stormy period, if not for her, for the adults around her. One of my favorite stories is that coming home from work I might ask “How was your day?” to which she would reply something like “What? Do you have to know everything about my life? Can't I have any privacy?” All three authors do offer advice that would have been instructive in dealing with my daughter. Lerner is most explicit about teens having problems. His next to last chapter is devoted entirely to problems, but really serious problems. All three authors need to acknowledge more explicitly that there is individual variability across every-day-variety teens in how positive their adolescent development is. One of the main tasks of adolescence is charting some beginning autonomy from parents. As a result, parenting an adolescent involves finding the right balance of autonomy and control, and individual teens vary in the balance they need. Matching one's parenting to the needs of the individual child is perhaps the biggest challenge of parenting. Damon addresses this issue to some extent in his final chapter. But I think a bit more attention could have been paid to the trials and tribulations of parenting a teen without distracting from the overall message of positive development. Another limitation is the need to more fully address the socially changing place of adolescence in the life course. Adolescence in fact no longer represents the transition to adulthood. “Emerging adulthood” as defined by Arnett (2000) and others can extend through the twenties. As a result, adolescence is no longer a threshold. This has important implications for how adults treat teens, what they expect of them, and what positive developments can be envisioned for them. Damon addresses the delay of adulthood but mainly as a contributor to the teen's lack of purpose, not an issue that should influence parental behavior. This is a major change in the human life course that affects both adolescence and young adulthood. A final point is that the three authors could easily have collaborated on a single volume that would offer parents a coherent message on how to promote the positive development of their teen. Nonetheless, there is also distinctness to each book that would have been lost if they were integrated. And having three books with a positive focus on adolescence may carry more impact than a single larger volume. These are three very interesting and valuable additions to the developmental press for an educated lay audience. References Arnett, J. (2000). Emerging adulthood: A theory of development from the late teens through the twenties. American Psychologist, 55, 468−480. Gilliam, F., & Bales, S. (2001). Strategic frame analysis: Reframing America's youth. Social Policy Report, 15(3). Huston, A. (2008). From research to policy and back. Child Development, 79, 1−12.
Lonnie R. Sherrod Executive Director, Society for Research in Child Development, 2950 S. State Street, Suite 401, Ann Arbor, MI 48104, United States E-mail address: [email protected].
Contents lists available at ScienceDirect
Journal of Applied Developmental Psychology
Book review
It's 2009: Do you know where your teenager is? Peter L. Benson, Sparks: How parents can help ignite the hidden strengths of teenagers. Jossey-Bass, San Francisco, 2008, ISBN: 978-0-470-29404-8 (cloth), 235 pages, $24.95 William Damon, The path to purpose: How young people find their calling in life. Free Press, New York, 2008, ISBN: 978-1-41653724-3 (paper), 217 pp., $15.00 Richard M. Lerner, The good teen: Rescuing adolescence from the myths of the storm and stress years. Three Rivers Press (A Stonesong Press Book), New York, 2007, ISBN: 978-0-307-34758-9 (paper), 257 pp., $14.95 Parenting a teenager is no easy task in today's world. Evidence for this statement can be found in the sizeable number of public service announcements (PSAs) about parenting teens—keeping track of their whereabouts, talking to them about sex, warning them about drugs, and so forth. These three books, intended for parents, practitioners, and other members of a lay audience, aim to ease the job. They offer advice and guidance on the nature of contemporary adolescents, their needs, and how parents, teachers and others may contribute to their positive development. Having been concerned throughout my career with using research from developmental science to influence policy for children, youth and families, I have always been interested in dissemination. Most scientists recognize the need to disseminate their research to those who have power over science funding and policy (Huston, 2008). Few have responded, however, to the need to bring their expertise to the public to help them with their tasks of daily living such as parenting. One of my pet peeves has been that when I enter a bookstore and look across the shelves of psychology books, I rarely recognize the name of an author who is a respected research scientist. These three books are welcome exceptions. Each author is a scholarly authority on adolescent development, and in these books they offer their expertise and wisdom to the public, translating that expertise into “how to” advice for parents and others concerned with teenagers. I would highly recommend any or all of these books to any parent of a teenager, to anyone who works with teens, or to anyone with an interest in adolescence. The three books share the important common theme of adopting a positive perspective on adolescence. Benson discusses “sparks,” which he defines as hidden strengths, and offers advice for parents on identifying and nourishing sparks. Damon focuses on purpose, the adolescent quest to find it, and how parents and others can help. Lerner, following a positive youth development (PYD) approach, which has also been important in guiding research and policy in recent years, debunks the idea that adolescence is necessarily a turbulent time of “stress and storm” because of the significant and varied changes that ensue. This positive perspective on adolescents is sorely needed at a time when most adults view teenagers negatively. Not only does the public have a negative view of youth, but it is virtually impossible to combat those views with examples of positive contributions by teens (Gilliam & Bales, 2001). Advising parents and others of the positive side of adolescence and describing how they can promote further positive development is hence both unique and quite needed. Peter Benson's work at the Search Institute is in many ways responsible for the current positive youth development approach to research and policy on adolescence and youth. Although the original formulation has undergone considerable revision as research has continued, the idea that individuals and communities hold assets which are the keys to positive development still represents an important contribution. Sparks hold many similarities to assets. Sparks are “hidden flames” that originate in the gut, that can represent any area, that get youth going on a positive path, and help them develop a life purpose (in this way he connects to Damon's thesis). Sparks are what makes the teen want to get out of bed in the morning. Benson begins his book by justifying the need for attention to sparks because of the many and varied challenges confronting today's young people. These challenges include: the overwhelming nature of the technological revolution that tends to separate teens from their parental generation, increasing globalization and diversity (including the growing gap between the rich and the poor), the expectation and need for quick results, sexual overexposure, the threat of terrorism and other political events that succeeded the September 11, 2001 attacks, the stress associated with the intensity of family schedules, and parents' expressed fears for their children's safety. Recognizing one's sparks helps teens deal with these challenges. It is the parents' job to help their doi:10.1016/j.appdev.2009.07.004
646
Book review
adolescent recognize his/her sparks. This means helping the youth realize that there is something good and special about them, and that they are a person of worth and value to the world. Sparks work similarly to assets in that they relate to many of the same positive outcomes as assets, such as good academic performance and high self esteem. The first part of the book presents the intellectual argument for sparks and the latter half offers advice to parents on how to recognize and nourish sparks. There are five steps: recognize the power of sparks, know your teenager, help discover and reveal their sparks, be captain of your teen's spark team, and keep the spark lit. This section of the book contains much useful specific advice for parents: for example, how to deal with your teen wanting to drop out of something you think is important. The section is also peppered with individual examples based on interviews with adolescents. The next section then offers more detailed examples, “Stories from across America on the road to a hopeful future.” Here Benson introduces the PYD idea of thriving, and describes the importance of thriving youth to a thriving nation. He offers support for his thesis on sparks and thriving from a variety of other youth leaders and ends with a very valuable directory of resources. His book is in these ways the most user-friendly of the three. The path to purpose is Bill Damon's third book on adolescent development. All three reflect his background in moral development; here he focuses on purpose. A purpose is a deeper reason for the motivation and goals that drive daily behavior. “A purpose can organize an entire life, imparting not only meaning but also inspiration and motivation for ongoing learning and achievement (pg 23).” But a purpose contributes not only to individual development but also to the larger society in which the individual lives, hence the connection to moral development. He uses the phrase “noble purpose” often. Work, religion, family, politics, art, sports are all important sources for purpose, but the adolescent often needs help in finding a “calling” through these outlets. In fact, he argues that family is the most important source. Damon relies on research in developmental psychology and positive psychology to justify his concern for the importance of purpose. He then reports a study of 400 young people. Using surveys, interviews, and case studies, Damon explores the role of purpose in the lives of today's adolescents. From this work, he defines four groups of teens: the disengaged, the dreamers, the dabblers, and the purposeful. The names aptly define the groups. He finds roughly equal numbers in each group, a bit less (20%) in purposeful and a few more in dabblers (31%). He selects a group of the most purposeful and studies them in detail. These profiles of young people who have made a commitment to a noble cause are the highlight of the book for me; the chapter is short and I would have loved to see more. Finally Damon offers recommendations for how significant others such as parents and teachers can help youth find their purpose. He offers nine rather specific suggestions for having a positive impact on a teen's search for purpose; these include listen carefully, support interests, and open dialogues. He argues that our focus on “short horizons” is the greatest barrier to youth finding purpose and sees parents as one of the main forces that can combat this focus on short horizons so prevalent in the media and popular culture. In the final chapter, he discusses what I consider to be the biggest challenge of parenting. He describes the parenting paradox that youth need to find their own purpose but they cannot do so without the advice and assistance of parents and other significant others in their lives. Hence successful parenting involves finding the right balance of freedom and guidance. Damon's Path to purpose necessarily shares numerous similarities with Benson's thesis. It is concerned with positive development and he uses that literature as the basis for his argument. He also collects information on contemporary youth, and this information is amongst the most interesting parts of the book. He also alludes to “sparks,” advising parents to listen closely for a spark and then fan its flame. His goal for youth is also to promote “thriving.” The tagline on Lerner's The good teen is “Groundbreaking research reveals everything you think you know about teens is wrong.” This reveals the two most important features of this book. Of the three books, it is the most based in the now extensive research literature on adolescent development, and hence it is the most academic even though it does not present original data as the other two do. It also portrays current adolescence in a positive light; adolescence is not only positive if we do the right things. He supports this point by describing Mark Twain's Huckleberry Finn and Tom Sawyer as metaphors for all teens; these boys showed problems, as do all youth, but the trouble they got into did not define who they were. Lerner offers an almost autobiographical description of his research career that led to the development of the ideas presented in this book. He uses his own research as well as that of others to support the theory. One study with Carl Taylor included members of youth gangs from Detroit. He reports feeling surprise that many of these youth showed evidence of positive development despite all odds being against them. The reason is that they found developmental assets in their environment of which they were able to take advantage to develop one or more of the five Cs that constitute positive development. Lerner then describes the five Cs that represent the basic tenets of the theory, the building blocks of positive development. They are: Competence, Confidence, Connection, Character, and Caring. A sixth C, Contribution, emerges from the first five. After summarizing his argument that adolescence is represented by positive development, not storm and stress, he devotes a chapter to each of the 6 Cs. These chapters offer how-to advice for parents on how to nourish development of the 6 Cs. He describes three key elements of parenting that promote the development of the Cs: Teens need sustained positive interaction with adults; teens need to participate in structured activities that enable them to develop life skills; teens should become leaders of valued community activities. In the 6th C chapter, he offers a useful recap in a two-page table of ways to build strengths and develop the Cs. He later acknowledges that real problems can arise and offers advice on how to cope with these challenges. In the final chapter, he issues a call to arms for the nation by describing this country's need for a national youth policy. He makes the important point that parents cannot just worry about their own children; we all need to be concerned with all our youth if the nation is to thrive. Finally, he also offers an extensive reference list but one probably more conducive to uses by an academic audience. Although somewhat more academic than the other two books because of the extensive reliance on the research literature, this book offers a wealth of valuable information for parents.
Book review
647
It is not easy to find fault with these books. If I were to offer a criticism of all three, it is that they do not sufficiently acknowledge that there in fact are negative aspects to adolescence with which parents have to cope. My daughter was an easy pleasant baby and child, and she is now a charming young adult. However, adolescence was in fact a stormy period, if not for her, for the adults around her. One of my favorite stories is that coming home from work I might ask “How was your day?” to which she would reply something like “What? Do you have to know everything about my life? Can't I have any privacy?” All three authors do offer advice that would have been instructive in dealing with my daughter. Lerner is most explicit about teens having problems. His next to last chapter is devoted entirely to problems, but really serious problems. All three authors need to acknowledge more explicitly that there is individual variability across every-day-variety teens in how positive their adolescent development is. One of the main tasks of adolescence is charting some beginning autonomy from parents. As a result, parenting an adolescent involves finding the right balance of autonomy and control, and individual teens vary in the balance they need. Matching one's parenting to the needs of the individual child is perhaps the biggest challenge of parenting. Damon addresses this issue to some extent in his final chapter. But I think a bit more attention could have been paid to the trials and tribulations of parenting a teen without distracting from the overall message of positive development. Another limitation is the need to more fully address the socially changing place of adolescence in the life course. Adolescence in fact no longer represents the transition to adulthood. “Emerging adulthood” as defined by Arnett (2000) and others can extend through the twenties. As a result, adolescence is no longer a threshold. This has important implications for how adults treat teens, what they expect of them, and what positive developments can be envisioned for them. Damon addresses the delay of adulthood but mainly as a contributor to the teen's lack of purpose, not an issue that should influence parental behavior. This is a major change in the human life course that affects both adolescence and young adulthood. A final point is that the three authors could easily have collaborated on a single volume that would offer parents a coherent message on how to promote the positive development of their teen. Nonetheless, there is also distinctness to each book that would have been lost if they were integrated. And having three books with a positive focus on adolescence may carry more impact than a single larger volume. These are three very interesting and valuable additions to the developmental press for an educated lay audience. References Arnett, J. (2000). Emerging adulthood: A theory of development from the late teens through the twenties. American Psychologist, 55, 468−480. Gilliam, F., & Bales, S. (2001). Strategic frame analysis: Reframing America's youth. Social Policy Report, 15(3). Huston, A. (2008). From research to policy and back. Child Development, 79, 1−12.
Lonnie R. Sherrod Executive Director, Society for Research in Child Development, 2950 S. State Street, Suite 401, Ann Arbor, MI 48104, United States E-mail address: [email protected].