News You Can Use on Health Topics

By Diana Zuckerman, Ph.D.

General Health and Mental Health
. ADHD Treatment: Medications and Alternatives
. Mood Gym
. Caffeine for Sleep Deprived Teens
. Pesticides May Cause Leukemia
. Are Backpacks Dangerous for Kids?
. Helping Kids Cope with Disaster
. Race and Friendships
. Wake Up and Read This!: Research on Sleep Deprivation
. Sleepy Children
. Schools and Sleep Deprivation
. Coping Among Asian American and Pacific Islander Youth
. Adults Really Do Matter to Kids
. Preventing and Treating Kids' Depression Without Drugs
. Feeling Down and Acting Tough: Girls and Depression

Brain Development
. Mom was Right: Teen Brains are Different
. Message from Teen Brains: It’s Not Too Late!

Cancer
. The Cervical Cancer Vaccine: What Every Woman Should Know and What the Future Holds

Dating and Sex
. Teen Pregnancy and Intelligence
. Morning After Pills
. HIV is Increasing Dramatically Among Teen Girls
. Adolescents Take Risks with AIDS
. Fatherhood Puts Boys at Risk
. Less Sex, More Condoms, Fewer Teen Births
. Dolls Are Not a Substitute for Babies
. See dating violence articles in "News You Can Use on Kids and Violence"

Dieting, Weight, and Physical Activity
. Fast Food Facts: Calories and Fat
. Obesity, TV and Soft Drinks
. Sticks and Stones: Does Teasing Hurt?
. Weight Report Cards?
. Recreation Programs Work
. Reading, Writing and Soft Drinks
. Obesity Hurts Quality of Life
. Curing Obesity?
. Free Time
. Is the Skinny Pill for Kids Safe?
. Weight and Body Image: A Problem for Boys and Girls of All Races
. Invisible Obesity
. Girls and Weight Control: Let Them Eat Cake?
. Couch Potatoes Beware

Drinking and Drugs
. HBO film on Cognitive Behavioral Therapy to treat addiction
. Teen Jobs and Drug Use
. Just One Drink Can be Too Many
. Does Smoking Marijuana Predict Other Drug Use?
. Reducing Smoking, Drinking and Drug Use
. Smoking Marijuana: An Update
. The Impact of Marijuana
. Huffing Glue, Paint, and Cleaners
. Drinking Now, Problems Later
. ALERT: Brain Damage from Drug Use
. Drunk Drivers and Young Passengers

Early Puberty and Problems in Sexual Development
. Phthalates and Children’s Products
. Are Pretty Products Causing Early Puberty?
. Boys To Men
. When Little Girls Become Women
. Girls to Women

Health Insurance
. Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP)

Infants and Breastfeeding
.  Back to Sleep! A Campaign Against SIDS
.  Breastfeeding and Rickets          (PDF Format)
.  Breast Surgery Likely To Cause Breastfeeding Problems

The Medicine Cabinet
. The Facts About Medication for Colds and the Flu
. Lice are Lousy but not Unhealthy
. Just Say No to Lice, But Not to Nits
. Immunizing Your Child
. Tampon Safety

Mentoring and Role Models
. Mentoring Can Make A Difference
. Role Models For Urban Youth

Risky Behaviors
. Are religious kids more likely to be good?
. What Causes Teen Pregnancy, Violence, and Drug Use?
. Reaching Out to Homeless and Runaway Youth
. Sleep, Safety, Drugs, Teen Pregnancy, and Other Reasons to Change School Times

Smoking
. How does smoking start?
. Smoking and Girls
. Nicotine Patches And Teens
. Anti-smoking Campaigns Can Prevent Teen Smoking
. Another Reason Not to Smoke

Sports
. Soccer and Brain Injuries
. Making Baseball Safer for Kids
. Girls and Sports
. Jocks, Head Injuries, and Learning Problems
. Girls, Sports and Soda: A Bad Mix?
. Sports Can Hurt As Well As Help Urban Youth

Toys and Other Children's Products
. Toys-R-Dangerous?

Vaccines
. Immunizing Your Child

Violence and Kids

Media
. Violent Songs
. Reducing the Dangers of the Internet
. Teens as Online Victims
. Media and Kids: Everything You Were Afraid to Ask
. Copy Cats that Kill
. Violence in G (G-Rated Animated Films)
. Violent Video Games Can Increase Aggression

Dating and Violence
. Dating Violence: What Everyone Needs to Know         (Print Brochure)
. Surviving Sexual Assault
. Dating Violence Inspires Other Problems
. Is Stalking More Common Than We Think?
. Teen Mothers as Targets of Violence
. Dating and Other Dangers for High School Girls
. Boyfriends, Violence, and Teen Pregnancy
. Dating Violence: A Two Way Street, But Girls Are Hurt Most
. Teen Love as a Four Letter Word
. Do Virginity Pledges Delay Teen Sex?
. Dating Violence and Foster Care

Child Abuse and Domestic Violence
. When Relatives Care for Kin
. Father Figures are the Answer, But What is the Question?
. Linking Spouse and Child Abuse
. Witnessing Violence at Home

Teen Suicide
. How Childhood and Youth Experiences Link to Suicide
. Research on Teen Suicide
. Smoking, Drinking, Marijuana, Family Problems, and Suicide

Other Violence
. Bullying and Violence
. Youth Violence in Rural Areas
. Can Schools Prevent Violence?
. When Silence Means Violence
. Does Counseling After Tragedy Really Help?
. Can the Calendar Predict School Violence?
. State Gun Control Laws Work, Sort Of
. Guns at Home
. Girls and Crime
. When Little Kids Become Violent Teens
. What is to Blame for Youth Violence?: The Media, Guns, Parenting, Poverty, Bad Programs or ...
. Is there a Youth Violence Epidemic?
. Research on Teen Violence: Classroom Killers and Teen Suicide
. Lessons for Littleton: What Research Can and Can’t Tell Us
. Back to School Lessons: The V (Violence) Joins the Three R’s
. TV Wrestling and Dating Don't Mix

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Mentoring and Role Models:

 

Mentoring Can Make A Difference

Mentoring programs have become increasingly trendy, but do they actually work? According to a recent review of 10 programs, caring adults in mentoring programs can prevent substance abuse and improve educational achievement and social development. And, the good news is that youth who need them the most -- the most disadvantaged -- benefit the most.

The authors also concluded that the relationships between mentors and children must be consistent and committed. Unfortunately, mentoring relationships that are short-lived or sporadic “can actually do more harm than good.”

Overall, youth who were randomly selected for mentoring programs consistently had better outcomes than youth who were randomly assigned to “control groups” that were not mentored. For example, youth who were mentored had fewer unexcused absences from school, were less likely to initiate drug use, and expressed more positive attitudes toward school and the future.

To work, these relationships have to last. Youth in relationships that only lasted 3-6 months did not show these benefits. In contrast, youth in mentoring relationships that lasted more than one year felt more confident about doing their schoolwork, skipped fewer school days, had higher grades and were less likely to use drugs.

The research report is based on evaluations of mentoring programs by Public/Private Ventures, Manpower Demonstration Research Corporation and Mathematica Policy Research and others. They included six locally based programs (Across Ages in Philadelphia; The Buddy System in Hawaii; Building Essential Life Options Through New Goals at Texas A&M University; Linking Lifetimes in Philadelphia; Raising Ambition Instills Self-Esteem (RAISE) in Baltimore, and Sponsor a Scholar in Philadelphia), and four national programs (Big Brother/Big Sister, Campus Partners in Learning, Career and The Hospital Youth Mentoring Program). Some of these programs provided one-on-one mentoring only, while other mentoring programs also included workshops for parents, individual tutoring, scholarships, and other activities that may well have contributed to the child’s success.

The authors used more subjective measure to determine the aspects of mentoring that made it more effective. They concluded that the quality of the relationship as well as the frequency of contact was important. Mentors that got to know the youth’s family were especially helpful, and those youth were more likely to do well in school and go on to college.

Unfortunately, as is often the case, the devil is in the details. For example, in one program, girls of color who participated had a grade point average of B- compared to C+ for girls who did not participate. In another program, 53% went on to college compared to 49% in the control group -- not an enormous difference. And although school work improved slightly and there were other improvements, there were no changes in stealing or damaging property in the last year, getting in a fight, smoking, cheating or getting sent to the office for disciplinary action at school.

The greatest shortcoming of the research is that it includes programs that offer much more than mentoring. If a mentoring program also offers scholarships, it is not unreasonable to wonder if the scholarships may have been even more important than the mentoring. And the fact that short-term mentoring was not effective doesn’t necessarily mean that short-term mentoring is never effective. It could be that relationships that are unsuccessful don’t last long, rather than the other way around. However, this question was indirectly addressed by the authors, who pointed out that mentors who had the most hours of training and were more closely supervised were the most likely to maintain their mentoring relationship.

The report also offers some caveats. One is that the best mentoring programs cost approximately $1,000 per youth per year, not counting the donations of the mentor in time and money. Another is that it is difficult to find mentors who can make a long-term commitment and have money to take a child to the movies, museums, or other places. Older mentors have the time but may not have the resources, whereas young professionals may have the resources but not have enough time. This study suggests that the challenge is to find the mentors, and keep them involved through a structured program.

Reference:
Mentoring: A Promising Strategy for Youth Development.
Susan M. Jekielek, Kristin A. Moore, Elizabeth C. Hair, and Harriet J. Scarupa.
ChildTrends Issue Brief, February 2002, available free online at www.childtrends.org

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Role Models For Urban Youth

There’s a lot of talk about role models, but not much information on who kids choose as their models in their lives. A new study of more than 700 12-to 17-year-old Los Angeles adolescents revealed some surprising findings.

Fifty-six percent of the youths named a role model. There was no significant difference between boys and girls or younger and older youths. Those who had a role model, especially someone they knew personally, tended to have higher self-esteem and higher grades. White youths who did not live with their fathers were less likely to abuse drugs or alcohol if they had a role model.

Those who had role models had a stronger ethnic identity than those who did not, and youngsters who chose someone they knew as a role model had stronger ethnic identity than those who chose a celebrity.

The youths were ethnically diverse, although more than half were Hispanic. Youths from families with higher incomes were more likely to have role models. As a result, whites were somewhat more likely to have role models than were their classmates.

Nearly three out of four chose a role model of the same ethnic group, and 86 percent chose a role model of the same sex. Almost all the African-Americans chose a role model of the same race, compared to 79 percent of whites and 64 percent of Hispanics. Boys were more likely than girls to choose a role model of the same sex.

Who are the role models? A parent was named by 22 percent of the students, whereas 18 percent (almost all of whom were boys) named an athlete. Siblings and singers were each named by 10 percent. Unrelated friends and acquaintances were named by 7 percent of the boys and 14 percent of the girls. These included peers, adult friends, teachers, and doctors and lawyers.

The implications for adults are clear: Role models help youth feel better about themselves and do better in school.

Reference:
Role Models, Ethnic Identity, and Health-Risk Behaviors in Urban Adolescents
Antronette Yancey, M.D., M.P.H., Judith Siegel, Ph.D., Kimberly McDaniel, Ph.D.
Archives in Pediatrics & Adolescent Medicine, Vol. 156, January 2002, pp. 55-61.
Available from Dr. Yancey at ayancey@ucla.edu or the School of Public Health, Dept. of Health Services, Box 956900, A2-125 CHS, Los Angeles, CA 90095-6900.