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Abstract
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Research on resilience suggests that individuals can and often do succeed despite significant disadvantages (Masten, 2001). Although social science disciplines have historically focused on prevention and intervention efforts related to traits and characteristics of mental illness, there has been a paradigm shift toward focusing on resilience (Richardson, 2002). The field of juvenile justice, however, largely continues to focus on mental illness, with numerous investigations studying risk factors for juvenile delinquency, antisocial personality disorder, and other mental disorders. To date, few investigations have examined the influence of protective factors for youth on probation despite the potential for targeted interventions (Kazemian, 2007). This study seeks to fill this gap in the juvenile justice literature by offering a preliminary investigation into hope, a possible protective factor, in a sample of Latino/a youth on probation.
Hope is characterized as a cognitive-motivational construct that includes a set of beliefs in one's own strength to achieve goals and overcome obstacles. Hope comprises three major components: goals, pathways, and agency (Snyder et al., 1997). Goal-directed thinking is the ability to conceptualize short- or long-term goals with variable probability and importance for attainment (e.g., "I will get an A in math"). Pathways thinking refers to the specific strategies generated through internal speech to achieve a goal (e.g., "I can think of many ways to get out of a jam"; Snyder et al., 1991). Agency thinking refers to the sustaining motivation to achieve conceptualized goals (e.g., "I am not going to be stopped"; Snyder et al., 1997). Individuals with high levels of hope exhibit goal-directed thinking, pathways thinking, and agency thinking, which includes motivation, a sense of self-efficacy, and a plan to achieve their goals (Snyder, Lopez, Shorey, Rand, & Feldman, 2003).
Based on resilience theory, increasing interest has been directed toward investigating protective factors, such as hope, which can buffer young people from the undesirable effects of risk factors for delinquency, such as dysfunctional families and low educational achievement (Sourander et al., 2006). Protective factors provide juveniles with the tools that allow them to surmount obstacles or persevere despite the presence of risk factors for delinquency (Seligman et al., 2005). Youth on probation who desist from delinquency do so despite significant risk factors. Although youth on probation tend to share many of the same risk factors at the onset of delinquency, there may be certain protective factors that are related to desistance from delinquency (Kazemian, 2007).
Until recently, research on the influence of hope in children and adolescents has been lacking (Lopez, Rose, Robinson, Marques, & Pais-Ribiero, 2009). Scholarship on hope, including goal-directed thinking, pathways thinking, and agency thinking, has focused on investigating whether hope is a stable psychological trait, as opposed to a fluctuating cognitive or emotional state, with mixed results. The few longitudinal studies of hope in adolescents have indicated that over a 1-year period, high levels of hope appeared to be a stable psychological trait (e.g., Valle, Huebner, & Suldo, 2006). Conversely, others have found hope to be malleable within a therapeutic context (Feldman & Dreher, 2012). Investigations of hope across genders have also been mixed. One study found hope was invariant between male and female adolescents (Edwards, Ong, & Lopez, 2007), while another found levels of hope declined in females during adolescence at a significantly steeper rate than it did in their male peers (Heaven & Ciarrochi, 2008). Recent research with children and adolescents reveals hope as a key indicator of psychological strength (Valle et al., 2006). Valle et al. (2006) found high levels of hope serve as a protective factor against internalizing problems. They found adolescents with high levels of hope reported higher levels of life satisfaction and used adaptive coping strategies when faced with significant stressors. These findings highlight the potential importance of hope for youth on probation; provide further insight into target areas for intervention if hope is malleable; and suggest that hope may need to be investigated separately for adolescents by gender. Although hope has yet to be examined specifically within the juvenile justice population, the inverse of hope, or hopelessness, has been investigated. Hopelessness represents a lack of future orientation, which may cause a juvenile to discount future consequences of his or her behavior and, therefore, may contribute to the likelihood of persistent criminal offending. High rates of comorbidity have been observed between depression, of which hopelessness is a key component, and conduct disorder, which can lead to contact with the legal system (Ryan & Redding, 2004). For example, detainment in a juvenile detention facility resulting from delinquent acts characteristic of conduct disorder exacerbates feelings of hopelessness (Ryan & Redding, 2004). The research explored herein correlating hope among non-juvenile justice involved adolescents with positive outcomes (e.g., Valle et al., 2006) and hopelessness with juvenile delinquency (e.g., Ryan & Redding, 2004) indicates the possibility of a positive relation between hope, a cognitive-motivational trait, and desistance from delinquent behavior among both females and males. Since hope shows promise for predicting desistance from juvenile delinquency, determining whether hope might act as a protective factor requires further investigation. Juvenile justice researchers and practitioners have focused more attention on studying risk factors for juvenile delinquency than on the positive psychological variables that may serve as potential protective factors for at-risk youth. To further understand the role of protective factors associated with desisting from delinquency, this study investigated the presence of self-reported hope within a sample of Latino/a youth on probation (N = 153) and the association of hope with risk for recidivism. Levels of hope were consistent between males and females. Latino/a youth on probation have significantly lower levels of self-reported hope than each of 5 diverse samples of youth from previously published studies.
RESULTS also reveal a moderately low correlation between hope and risk for recidivism. Implications for theory, research, and applied practice are discussed.
Jennifer M. Twyford, Graduate School of Psychology, California Lutheran University; Erin Dowdy, Department of Counseling, Clinical, and School Psychology, University of California, Santa Barbara; and Jill D. Sharkey, Department of Counseling, Clinical, and School Psychology, University of California, Santa Barbara. This research was supported in part by a not-for-profit grant from the University of California, Santa Barbara Humanities and Social Science Research Grant Program Award. Correspondence concerning this article should be addressed to Jennifer Twyford, Graduate School of Psychology, California Lutheran University, 2201 Outlet Center Drive, Suite 600, Oxnard, CA 93036. E-mail: jtwyford@callutheran.edu
Keywords: Latino/a, youth on probation, juvenile delinquency, hope, recidivism, positive psychology, juvenile justice
Language: en |