Citation

Ungar M, Liebenberg L. Sch. Psychol. Int. 2013; 34(5): 514-526.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2013, SAGE Publishing)

DOI

10.1177/0143034312472761

PMID

unavailable

Abstract

In this article we examine how cultural and community factors interact with individual level factors to predict school participation. Participants were 497 Atlantic Canadian youth purposefully selected because of their concurrent use of more than one government service or community program at the time they were interviewed. Results revealed that contextual factors associated with resilience (e.g. cultural adherence and involvement in one's community) affect school engagement more than individual or relational factors among this population. Furthermore, these contextual resilience factors showed a pattern of differential impact, with the greatest influence occurring in the lives of visible minority youth. Findings suggest that improvements in school engagement are likely to result from school-based efforts to enhance children's experience of their culture and involvement in community activities. Sampling youth outside regular classroom settings and including meso- and exo-systemic factors in studies of school engagement may help to identify protective processes not previously discussed in the literature.

Language: en