Promoting Positive Youth Development: a Psychosocial Intervention Evaluation

Convergence among treatment, prevention, and developmental psychosocial intervention approaches has led to the recognition of the need for evaluation models and research designs that employ a full range of evaluation information to provide an empirical basis for enhancing the efficiency, efficacy, and effectiveness of prevention and psychosocial positive youth development interventions (PYD). This study reports an investigation of a PYD psychosocial program using an Outcome Mediation Cascade (OMC) evaluation model, which is an integrated model for evaluating the empirical intersection between intervention and developmental processes. The Changing Lives Program (CLP) is a community engaged PYD psychosocial intervention for multi-ethnic, multi-problem at risk youth in urban alternative high schools. Findings indicated that the hypothesized model fit the data, χ2(7) = 6.991, p = .43, RMSEA = .00, CFI = 1.00, WRMR = .459. Findings also provided preliminary evidence consistent with the hypothesis that, in addition to having effects on targeted positive outcomes, PYD interventions are likely to have progressive cascading effects on untargeted problem outcomes (in this case, behavioral outcomes) that operate through effects on positive outcomes.