Youth Active Citizenship: psychosocial factors, processes and practices.

The concept of youth active citizenship is a complex and challenging issue to deal with. Youth participative behaviors are rapidly decreasing in the contemporary scenario, but more attention must be given to the psychological aspects of citizenship and various forms of youth participatory practices. The aims of this research were to describe the citizenship participation behaviors of youth; to explore how the factors at individual, micro and sociodemographic level are related to the different behavioral components of youth active citizenship; to evaluate a participatory school-based intervention co-led by youth and adults; to examine the practices of youth active citizenship in youth organizations. Mixed-methods are used to account for the different and complementary aspects of youth citizenship. Methods used for the overall research design were: a longitudinal questionnaire for the analysis of the process of construction of active citizenship (chapter 2); a mixed-method evaluation of a school-based intervention consisted in a questionnaire, focus group and interviews (chapter 3), and qualitative case studies for the analysis of organizational practices (chapter 4). Results from the longitudinal study show that the levels of participative behaviors are decreasing in time, while political interest, family context and membership in students, religious and dealing with social issues organizations seem to be important factors that enhance active citizenship. Results from the evaluation of the school-based participatory research show that open school climate and an improvement of quality of participation at school favor forms of political participation. Moreover, the process and the outcome of critical awareness are perceived as fundamental in the process of constructing active citizenship. Results from the analysis of two youth organization practices reveal the importance to create opportunities to develop youth agency and power. A final discussion is focused on the implications for future research and interventions.