The Need to Contribute During Adolescence
By Andrew J. Fuligni, from the University of California, Los Angeles
Link and Overview
Andrew Fuligni’s article gives an overview of teenagers' powerful drive to contribute to their world and suggests it is a ‘resource’ worth engaging with.
TL/DR
The article unpacks the drive to contribute across two domains.
The social and developmental need
Contributing is well established across all age groups.
The teenager’s increased social world, maturity, cognition, and social re-orientation make contributing especially important.
The ability to contribute is an essential skill for acceptance and transition into adulthood.
Suggests contributing may help with the fundamental developments of adolescence: healthy autonomy, identity development, intimacy.
Contributing develops generativity, a key part of which is the motivation to be useful and impact the world and leave a legacy.
Neural and biological mechanisms
Contributing activates areas of the brain “densely populated by dopamine and opioid receptors”, as well as “elements of the ‘social brain’” and the “cognitive control processes”.
These are all areas that develop significantly during adolescence.
Teenagers move away from the simple “rule-based” decision-making about contributing in childhood into more flexible, nuanced decisions about contributing.
Then, he draws on those domains and offers ways to consider how contributing can be seen in various contexts.
Opportunities to contribute
FAMILIES
A powerful context in which a sense of ability and responsibility can develop.
Involvement in decision-making and recognising the ideas and judgements of adolescents as valid is important in supporting healthy development.
(As an aside, Fuligni draws an interesting distinction between participating in decision-making and having autonomy here. Of course, both are agentic processes, but the point he is making is that the former is a form of agency that’s developed within a meaningful relationship, while the latter can be devoid of that).
PEERS
Friends become an increasing source of social and emotional support, and the more this is experienced, the better.
Provide opportunities to offer ideas, play a role, and feel noticed and valued within a more equal context.
Adults need to recognise that much of this happens as teenagers are “just hanging out” and shouldn’t devalue that.
SCHOOLS
Well established that motivation is increased when students get to play a role in decision-making about:
Course work
Classroom practices
School policies
COMMUNITIES
Being involved in activities and groups that allow teenagers to contribute to their communities is important, but opportunities for this are unequally distributed.
A new focus is needed.
The article ends with Fuligni arguing that, while generally there was a decline in the contexts in which teenagers could contribute to their families and communities over the 20th century due to an increase in schooling pressures and a reduction in the need for them to be employed in work to support their families, it is time to re-recognise its importance and look for opportunities to tap into this “invaluable resource”.