Adolescent Social Connectedness and Young Adult Achievement: The Linking and Moderating Role of Self-Esteem Trajectories.

Social bonds are key for adolescent psychosocial development; how youth perceive their connectedness with family, school, peers, and communities varies widely, which may be interrelated with self-esteem over time. Using the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent to Adult Health (N = 8760), resear...

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Published in:Journal of Child & Family Studies Vol. 34; no. 4; pp. 974 - 990
Main Authors: Wickrama, Thulitha, Merten, Michael J., Terrell, Amanda
Format: Article
Published: Springer Nature Apr2025
Subjects:
Online Access:View this record in EBSCOhost
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        atl: Adolescent Social Connectedness and Young Adult Achievement: The Linking and Moderating Role of Self-Esteem Trajectories.
      aug:
        au:
          Wickrama, Thulitha
          Merten, Michael J.
          Terrell, Amanda
        affil:
          https://ror.org/043mer456 Department of Child, Youth and Family Studies, University of Nebraska-Lincoln, Lincoln, NE, USA
          https://ror.org/05jbt9m15 School of Human Environmental Sciences, University of Arkansas, Fayetteville, AR, USA
      su:
        Quantitative research
        Social status
        Social networks
        Quality of life
        Self-perception
        Statistical sampling
        Logistic regression analysis
        Descriptive statistics
        Chi-squared test
        Longitudinal method
        Data analysis software
      sug:
        subj:
          Quantitative research
          Social status
          Social networks
          Quality of life
          Self-perception
          Marketing Research and Public Opinion Polling
          Other Individual and Family Services
          Statistical sampling
          Logistic regression analysis
          Descriptive statistics
          Chi-squared test
          Longitudinal method
          Data analysis software
      keyword:
        Adolescence
        Connectedness
        Longitudinal
        Psychology and Cognitive Sciences Psychology Medical and Health Sciences Public Health and Health Services
        Self-esteem
        Young adult attainment
        Adolescence
        Connectedness
        Longitudinal
        Psychology and Cognitive Sciences Psychology Medical and Health Sciences Public Health and Health Services
        Self-esteem
        Young adult attainment
      ab: Social bonds are key for adolescent psychosocial development; how youth perceive their connectedness with family, school, peers, and communities varies widely, which may be interrelated with self-esteem over time. Using the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent to Adult Health (N = 8760), researchers examined how: (1) family, school/peer, and community connectedness linked with youth self-esteem trajectory classes, (2) self-esteem trajectory classes link with young adult socioeconomic and relationship outcomes including education level, income and close relationship quality, and (3) social connectedness is differentially related to young adult outcomes across self-esteem trajectory classes. While results showed that connectedness was universally beneficial, there were multiple significant differences between self-esteem classes with high self-esteem class showing highest levels of community, school and parental connectedness. Among all comparisons, consistently high self-esteem yielded optimal young adult socioeconomic outcomes in education level and income compared with both decreasing and increasing classes and better relationship quality compared with increasing class. Identifying members of different self-esteem trajectory classes with various patterns, and differing levels of social connectedness and young adult outcomes provides useful information for early developmental efforts, and program formulation. Highlights: We examined adolescent connectedness within family, school, and community contexts and trajectories of self-esteem. All forms of connectedness were found to be positively associated with the consistently high self-esteem trajectory. Any fluctuation in self-esteem over time was linked with lower attainment in young adulthood than consistently high self-esteem. High self-esteem during adolescence is a long-term protective factor.
      pubtype: Academic Journal
      doctype: Article
      src: R
    language: English
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