Development of the Self-Report Measures of Assessing Developmental Assets Among At-Risk Youth in Malaysia
- PDF / 228,225 Bytes
- 17 Pages / 439.37 x 666.142 pts Page_size
- 63 Downloads / 173 Views
Development of the Self-Report Measures of Assessing Developmental Assets Among At-Risk Youth in Malaysia Nor Ba’yah Abdul Kadir • Samsudin A. Rahim • Mimi Hanida Abdul Mutalib • Wan Amizah Wan Mahmud • Sheau Tsuey Chong Nasrudin Subhi
•
Published online: 27 May 2012 Springer Science+Business Media, LLC 2012
Abstract Measures of developmental assets were created as a new self-report to assess positive attitudes and behaviour among at-risk youth. The measure was examined in a sample of 744 at-risk youth aged between 13 and 25 who dwell in public housing projects in Malaysia. The Malaysian version of the developmental assets measures 23 dimensions of the participants in respect of their positive attitude and behaviour towards society, significant others and self. The results show that this measure has good psychometric properties, and is significantly associated with other constructs. This measure is useful in basic and applied research, and for intervention programmes. Keywords Developmental assets Internal assets External assets At-risk youth Malaysia
Introduction The Youth Index of Malaysia (2008) reported that 88 % of young people do not appear to be involved in activities that are identified as at-risk behaviour. Based on eight indices (self-development, social relationships, identity, self-potential, leisure activities, health, media access, and delinquent behaviour), the youth study revealed that media access and sport play an important role in preventing young people from risk behaviour (2008 Index Youth Malaysia, Malaysia). At-risk youth is a label used to describe youth who are in a disadvantaged environment and at risk of educational failure or dropping out of school or who are involved in delinquent activities. The at-risk label is used interchangeably with poverty. The risk was seen as being N. B. Abdul Kadir (&) S. A. Rahim M. H. Abdul Mutalib W. A. Wan Mahmud S. T. Chong N. Subhi Centre for Youth Empowerment, Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia, 43600 Bangi, Selangor, Malaysia e-mail: [email protected]
123
392
N. B. Abdul Kadir et al.
primarily located within the individual or family, rather than the society or culture (Schonert-Reichl 2000). The Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD 1995) defined youth at-risk as ‘‘… those failing in school and unsuccessful in making the transition to work and adult life and as a consequence are unlikely to be able to make a full contribution to active society’’ (p. 21). In our study, we defined at-risk as young people who have been exposed to an unhealthy lifestyle and disadvantaged neighbourhood environment. Therefore, our main concern are those youth who are exposed to an unhealthy lifestyle or disadvantaged neighbourhood environment. There is also evidence that young people are involved in cannabis use (Navaratnam and Foong 1989), substance use and alcohol abuse (Mohamed et al. 2008), tobacco (Hammond et al. 2008; Lim et al. 2006, 2010), committing crimes (Mey 2010), illegal motorcycle street racers (Wong 2011), and engag
Data Loading...
