This open access book focuses on the public health crisis of youth suicide and provides a review of current research and prevention practices. It addresses important topics, including suicide ...epidemiology, suicide risk detection in school and medical settings, critical cultural considerations, and approaches to lethal means safety. This book offers cutting-edge research on emerging discoveries in the neurobiology of suicide, psychopharmacology, and machine learning. It focuses on upstream suicide prevention research methods and details how cost-effective approaches can mitigate youth suicide risk when implemented at a universal level. Chapters discuss critical areas for future research, including how to evaluate the effectiveness of suicide prevention and intervention efforts, increase access to mental health care, and overcome systemic barriers that undermine generalizability of prevention strategies. Finally, this book highlights what is currently working well in youth suicide prevention and, just as important, which areas require more attention and support. Key topics include: The neurobiology of suicide in at-risk children and adolescents. The role of machine learning in youth suicide prevention. Suicide prevention, intervention, and postvention in schools. Suicide risk screening and assessment in medical settings. Culturally informed risk assessment and suicide prevention efforts with minority youth. School mental health partnerships and telehealth models of care in rural communities. Suicide and self-harm prevention and interventions for LGBTQ+ youth. Risk factors associated with suicidal behavior in Black youth. Preventing suicide in youth with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) and intellectual disability (ID). Youth Suicide Prevention and Intervention is a must-have resource for policy makers and related professionals, graduate students, and researchers in child and school psychology, family studies, public health, social work, law/criminal justice, sociology, and all related disciplines.
This article identifies gaps in services to lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer (LGBTQ) runaway and homeless youth (RHY) and offers recommendations from the literature to fill them. ...Participants were 24 staff from 19 LGBTQ-RHY-serving agencies across the country. Over a 2-month period, researchers conducted 1-hour phone interviews with program staff and agency directors. Data from the interview transcripts were coded using template analysis, and the researchers modified the themes using an iterative coding process. Analyses yielded the following themes: a) housing services, b) educational services, c) employment services, d) family services, e) LGBTQ-affirming services, f) cultural competency training, and g) advocacy and organizing. Participants' perceptions of these gaps are provided, as are literature-driven recommendations to address those gaps. The findings from this study have the potential to guide program developers and policy makers in providing comprehensive, LGBTQ-affirming services for a substantial portion of the RHY population.
•Twenty-four staff from 19 runaway/homeless youth (RHY) agencies identified gaps.•Interviews revealed client-level gaps in housing, education, and employment.•Support-system gaps included RHY prevention and intervention with families.•Other gaps appeared in LGBTQ-affirming services, training, and advocacy/organizing.•Literature-driven policy and program recommendations are provided.
Winner of the 2020 Goddard Riverside Stephan Russo Book Prize for Social JusticeA deeply affecting expose of America's hidden crisis of disconnected youth, in the tradition of Matthew Desmond and ...Adrian Nicole LeBlancFor the majority of young adults today, the transition to independence is a time of excitement and possibility. But 4.5 million young peopleor a stunning 11.5 percent of youth aged sixteen to twenty-fourexperience entry into adulthood as abrupt abandonment, a time of disconnection from school, work, and family. For this growing population of Americans, which includes kids aging out of foster care and those entangled with the justice system, life screeches to a halt when adulthood arrives. Abandoned is the first-ever exploration of this tale of dead ends and broken dreams.Author Anne Kim skillfully weaves heart-rending stories of young people navigating early adulthood alone, in communities where poverty is endemic and opportunities almost nonexistent. She then describes a growing awarenessincluding new research from the field of adolescent brain sciencethat ';emerging adulthood' is just as crucial a developmental period as early childhood, and she profiles an array of unheralded programs that provide young people with the supports they need to achieve self-sufficiency.A major work of deeply reported narrative nonfiction, Abandoned joins the small shelf of books that change the way we see our society and point to a different path forward.
Pacific Youth Lee, Helen
ANU Press eBooks,
2019
eBook
Open access
Pacific populations are becoming younger and this ‘youth bulge’ is often perceived as a dangerous precursor to civil unrest. Yet young people are also a valuable resource holding exciting potential ...for the future of island nations. Addressing these conflicting views of youth, this volume presents ethnographic case studies of young people from across the Pacific and the diaspora. Moving beyond the typical focus on ‘youth problems’ in reports by Pacific governments and development agencies, the authors examine the highly diverse lives and perspectives of young people in urban and rural locations. They celebrate the contributions of youth to their communities while examining the challenges they face. The case studies explore the impacts of profound local and global changes and cover a wide sweep of youth experiences across themes of education, employment and economic inequalities, political and civil engagement, and migration and the diaspora. Contributors to this volume bring many decades of experience of research with Pacific people as well as fresh perspectives from early career and graduate researchers. Most are anthropologists and their chapters contribute to the interdisciplinary fields of youth studies and Pacific studies, offering thought-provoking insights into the possibilities for Pacific youth as they face uncertain futures.
Unaccompanied youth homelessness is a serious concern. Response, however, has been constrained by the absence of credible data on the size and characteristics of the population and reliable means to ...track youth homelessness over time. We sought to address these gaps.
Using a nationally representative phone-based survey (N = 26,161), we solicited household and individual reports on different types of youth homelessness. We collected household reports on adolescents aged 13–17 and young adults aged 18–25, as well as self-reports from young adults aged 18–25. Follow-up interviews with a subsample (n = 150) provided additional information on youth experiences and enabled adjustment for inclusion errors.
Over a 12-month period, approximately 3.0% of households with 13- to 17-year-olds reported explicit youth homelessness (including running away or being asked to leave) and 1.3% reported experiences that solely involved couch surfing, resulting in an overall 4.3% household prevalence of any homelessness, broadly defined. For 18- to 25-year-olds, household prevalence estimates were 5.9% for explicitly reported homelessness, 6.6% for couch surfing only, and 12.5% overall. The 12-month population prevalence estimates, available only for 18- to 25-year-olds, were 5.2%, 4.5%, and 9.7%, respectively. Incidence rates were about half as high as prevalence rates. Prevalence rates were similar across rural and nonrural counties. Higher risk of homelessness was observed among young parents; black, Hispanic, and lesbian, gay, bisexual, or transgender (LGBT) youth; and those who did not complete high school.
The prevalence and incidence of youth homelessness reveal a significant need for prevention and youth-centric systems and services, as well as strategies to address disproportionate risks of certain subpopulations.
This book analyses young people’s societal participation as a central dimension of their well-being and as vitally important to secure the sustainable future of humankind and the whole eco-social ...system. It develops a theoretical framework for analysing youth participation holistically, embedded in its everyday context, and as a relational phenomenon, underpinned by universal human needs. It introduces innovative methodological approaches to study youth engagements in society. This book will appeal to scholars and students of youth studies, sociology, sustainable development, youth participation and education. It also offers new knowledge and theoretical readings for policy experts on youth and sustainable development, as well as for NGOs working with youth.
Although youth advisory structures (YASs) have proliferated internationally to facilitate the voice of young people, little is known about the practices of such groups, especially in the United ...States. To address this gap of knowledge, this study describes the findings of a scoping review of scholarly research on YAS in the United States. The review found that although the use of YAS is increasing, current scholarship offers little information about YAS processes or how youth are engaged. Most YAS in the review partnered with marginalized young people to inform research and programming around sensitive health topics, such as human immunodeficiency virus prevention. Youth who participated in YAS experienced positive outcomes such as leadership and skill development, healthier decision‐making, and confidence. Although most studies involved youth in minimal ways, there is a growing body of literature where youth are engaged in long‐term partnerships that support positive youth development. This review details other key characteristics of YAS and provides recommendations for best practices, such as building consensus around terms used to refer to YAS and promoting the dissemination of process details around YAS facilitation.
Highlights
Youth advisory structures (YASs) have proliferated internationally to facilitate the voice of young people.
Scholarship offers little information around how YASs are facilitated and how youths are engaged.
Most YASs partner with marginalized young people around sensitive health topics.
Outcomes of engagement in YASs include leadership, skill development, and healthier decision‐making.
Most YAS studies involve youth minimally but sustained partnerships with youth are increasing.
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