Building Protective Factors in Adolescents Through a Preventative, Communitybased, Outofschool Progr

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www.newheightsonline.org
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Building Protective Factors in Adolescents
Through a Preventative, Community-based,
Out-of-school Program

• Tracey Tucker, Director
• Brian Nelson, Asst. Adventure Coordinator

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Workshop Agenda

• What?
• Basic theory and philosophy
• So What?
• New Heights best practices
• Now What?
• Transference to adventure therapy

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What?

• What is New Heights all about?
• What are risk factors?
• What is resiliency theory?
• What are protective factors?

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• The areas most comprehensive out-of-school
  program.
• Established 20 years ago
• Drop in center for Portsmouth youth during the
  school year a day camp program for the Seacoast
  area during the summer
• Offer a variety of intentional programming from
  uniquely qualified staff

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Our Mission

• To assist Seacoast youth to develop the
  competence, character, confidence, and resiliency
  necessary for a healthy and successful adulthood.

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Risk Factors

• The features of an adolescent, the adolescents
  family system, or the adolescentss life
  experience, which seem to increase the odds of
  some poor life outcomes.
• School failure or drop-out
• Mental/emotional disorder
• Juvenile delinquency
• Substance abuse
• Vocational instability
• Social-relational problems

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In the Adolescent

• Fetal drug/alcohol effects
• Premature birth or complications
• Difficult temperament
• Shy temperament
• Neurological impairment

• Low IQ (lt 80)
• Chronic medical disorder
• Psychiatric disorder
• Repeated aggression
• Substance abuse
• Delinquency
• Academic Failure

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Family Characteristics

• Poverty
• Large family, 4 or more children
• Siblings within 2 years of child
• Parent with mental illness
• Parent with substance abuse
• Parent with criminality

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Family/Experiential

• Poor infant attachment to mother
• Long term absence of caregiver in infancy
• Witness to extreme conflict, violence
• Substantiated neglect
• Separation - divorce - single parent

• Negative parent/child relationship
• Sexual abuse
• Physical abuse
• Removal from home
• Frequent family moves
• Teen pregnancy

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Risk Factors

• Risk factors do not necessarily lead to negative
  life outcomes in people, but increase the
  probability that such problems might arise.
• Less significance in which risk factors are
  present, but how many risk factors are present.
• An aggregate of 4 tend to increase the
  likelihood of a negative life outcome.

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Resiliency Theory

• The beginnings of resiliency theory emerged
  through the study of individuals who avoided
  negative life outcomes despite experiencing
  several risk factors.
• These individuals were labeled invulnerable,
  stress-resistant, hardy, ego-resilient,
  and/or invincible.
• The concepts of protective factors emerge.

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Protective Factors

• Factors that buffer the effect of adversity
  (i.e., risk factors) through supports and
  opportunities.
• Explains a greater share of the variance of
  positive outcomes than risk factors.
• More profound impact on the life course of
  children that live and grow up in adverse
  conditions than risk factors.

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Qualities of the Adolescent

• Positive, easy temperament
• Autonomy and independence as a toddler
• High hopes and expectations for the future
• Internal locus of control as a teen

• Sense of humor
• Empathy
• Perceived competencies
• Above average IQ (gt100)
• Good reader
• Gets along with others
• Problem solving skills in school
• Interpersonally engaging, likeable

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Family Characteristics

• Lives at home
• Secure mother-infant attachment
• Warm relationship with a parent
• Inductive, consistent discipline by parents
• Perception that parents care
• Established routines in the home

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Social Support from Outside the Family

• Adult mentor for child outside immediate family
• Extra adult help for caretaker of family
• Support for the child from friends
• Support for child from a mentor at school
• Support for family from church
• Support for family from work place

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Protective Factors

• The greater the number of risk factors present,
  the greater number of protective factors needed
  to buffer against the pull-down effect of those
  risk factors.
• Increase the probability of a positive life
  outcome.
• One third of high risk adolescents will possess
  enough protective factors to be resilient.
• The remaining adolescents will need protective
  factors build into their lives.

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Applying Resiliency Theory

• Identifying missing protective factors and
  actively working to build and maintain protective
  factors in an adolescents life.
• Wherever a protective factor is absent, building
  it can increase the odds of better outcomes for
  high risk adolescents.
• Most effective approach to induce change in
  adolescents with a greater number of risk factors.

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So What?

• So what are best practices in building protective
  factors in adolescents?
• At New Heights, it is our
• Mentoring program
• Resiliency assessment

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Routes to Resilience

• Perceived Control and Competencies
• Predictable routines
• Discipline with discussion
• Problem solving skills
• Perceived true competencies
• Internal LOC
• Plans for future

• Social Connections
• Empathy
• Healthy relationships
• Mentoring

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Mentoring at New Heights

• Every kid that walks through our door after
  school is assigned to a New Heights staff.
• Established to track our participants and get
  information (med form, net resiliency assessment,
  participant folder).
• Serves as a point of contact within New Heights
  for parents, school personnel, etc.

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Mentoring at New Heights

• No kid is overlooked.
• Advocate for the child in behavior situations and
  for programming.
• Establish healthy adult mentoring relationships.
• Solid, firm connection within our organization.
• Builds continuity with school, community, home,
  etc.

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New Heights Resiliency Assessment

• 49 item survey adapted from a clinical assessment
  created and used by Dr. E. Vance, Medical
  Director of Children Services at Seacoast Mental
  Health Center.
• Assesses the protective factors and risk factors
  of an individual to get an idea of a individuals
  net resiliency.
• Mix of self reported items and assessed items.
• Administered by the mentor.

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Protective Factors Family Protective Factors

• Living with family
• Working parents
• Additional family and adults
• Positive relationships and feelings about family
  and home
• Contributing to the household
• Family outings
• Structure

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Protective Factors Extra-familial Social Support

• Mentoring adults
• Supportive peer group
• Supportive adults outside of the family

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Protective Factors Social Skills

• Getting along with adults and peers
• General likeability
• Sense of humor
• Empathy

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Protective Factors Outlooks and Attitudes

• Independent thinking
• Feeling good about future goals in life
• Having control in life

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Protective Factors Competencies

• Problem solving
• Effort in school
• Reading
• Extracurricular activities
• Hobbies
• Special talent and skills

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Risk Factors Childhood Disorders

• Chronic illnesses or injuries
• Behavioral or emotional problems
• Physical fights
• Juvenile justice
• Brain injuries

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Risk Factors Social Drift Factors

• Failing or thoughts of dropping out
• Negative peer group incarceration, drugs,
  alcohol, tobacco
• Personal usage of drugs, alcohol, tobacco

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Risk Factors Family Stress Factors

• Government assistance
• Single parent, separated parents, divorced
  parents
• 5 children in the home
• Moving in the past year
• Fighting or arguing with parents

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Risk Factors Experiential Risk Factors

• Out of home placement
• Abuse
• Neglect

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Risk Factors Parental Disorders

• Substance abuse
• Criminal involvement
• Mental or medical disorders

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Net Resiliency

• Allows the mentor and staff identify missing
  protective factors
• Work on building and maintaining protective
  factors
• Advocate for the child
• Measure change (pre and post assessments)

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Now What?

• Now what does this have to do with adventure
  therapy?
• Prevention to intervention
• Adventure programming
• Now what is it I can do in my job to build and/or
  maintain protective factors in my clients?

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Prevention to Intervention

• Intervention studies show removing risk factors
  is effective in low risk adolescents (lt4 risk
  factors present) to increase the probability of a
  positive life outcome.
• Building protective factors is more effective at
  increasing the probability of a positive life
  outcome in high risk adolescents (gt4 risk factors
  present).

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Building Protective Factors through Adventure
Programming

• Resiliency theory builds upon the foundations of
  holistic health of the emotional, social,
  physical, intellectual and spiritual arenas.
• Promoting resiliency addresses the developmental
  needs of safety, love, belonging, respect,
  autonomy, challenge/mastery, power and meaning.

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Adventure Programming as a Strategy

• Adventure and outdoor programming have inherent
  in them opportunities to build protective
  factors. This type of programming commonly
  focuses on
• Frequent problem solving decision making
• Establishment of personal and group goals
• Mastery of skills
• Individual and group experience

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Protective Factors Built During Adventure
Programming

• Family protective factors
• Chores and consequences
• Extra-familial social support
• Support from peers
• Social skills
• Helping others and social skills
• Outlooks and attitudes
• Reaching goals and thinking for oneself
• Competencies
• Mastery of skills and solving problems

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References

• Vance, J. E., Bowen, N. K., Fernandez, G.,
  Thompson, S. (2002). Risk and protective factors
  as predictors of outcome in adolescents with
  psychiatric disorder and aggression. Journal of
  the American Academy of Child and Adolescent
  Psychiatry, January 2002, 411.
• Benard, B. Marshall, K. Adventure education
  Making a lasting difference. Resilience Research
  for Prevention Programs. National Resilience
  Resource Center, University of Minnesota.
• Benard, B. (2004). Resiliency What we have
  learned. San Francisco WestEd.

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References

• Garmezy, N., Masten, A., Tellegen, A. (1984).
  The study of stress and competence in children.
  Child Development, 55, 97-111.
• Rutter, M. (1985). Resilience in the face
  adversity Protective factors and resistance to
  psychiatric disorders. British Journal of
  Psychiatry, 147, 598-611.
• Werner, E. E. (1989). High-risk children in
  young adulthood A longitudinal study from birth
  to 32 years. American Journal of Orthopsychiatry,
  59, 72-81.
• Luther, S. S., and Zigler, E. (1991).
  Vulnerability and competence A review of
  research on resilience in childhood. American
  Journal of Orthopsychiatry, 611, 6-22.

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Resources

• National Resilience Resource Center at the
  University of Minnesota www.cce.umn.edu/nrrc
• New Heights Adventures for Teens
• www.newheightsonline.org
• Eric Vance, M.D., Director of Children Services
  at Seacoast Mental Health Center, Portsmouth, NH
  
• evance_at_smhc-nh.org

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www.newheightsonline.org