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<p style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt; font-size: 11pt;"><a href="https://www.brookings.edu/blog/education-plus-development/2019/08/09/how-do-social-and-emotional-skills-develop-in-youth/?utm_campaign=Brookings%20Brief&utm_source=hs_email&utm_medium=email&utm_content=75547518" style="color: rgb(5, 99, 193); text-decoration: underline;" id="LPlnk360139"><span style="font-family: "Cordia New", sans-serif;">https://www.brookings.edu/blog/education-plus-development/2019/08/09/how-do-social-and-emotional-skills-develop-in-youth/?utm_campaign=Brookings%20Brief&utm_source=hs_email&utm_medium=email&utm_content=75547518</span></a></p>
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<p style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt; font-size: 11pt;"><b style="font-family: "Cordia New", sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 18pt; color: rgb(16, 16, 16); font-family: "Cordia New", sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "Cordia New", sans-serif;">How Do
Social & Emotional Skills Develop in Youth?</span></span></b></p>
<p style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt; font-size: 11pt;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; color: rgb(16, 16, 16); font-family: "Cordia New", sans-serif;"><img 0?="" width="1230" height="409" id="Picture_x0020_2" alt="Pupils react after receiving their A-level exam results at St Leonards-Mayfield School in Mayfield, southern England August 15, 2013. More than 300,000 teenage students received their A-level results, in England, Wales and Northern Ireland on Thursday. REUTERS/Neil Hall (BRITAIN - Tags: EDUCATION SOCIETY) - LM1E98F0SJU01" style="width: 12.8125in; height: 4.2604in; user-select: none; font-family: "Cordia New", sans-serif;" src="service.svc/s/GetFileAttachment?id=AAMkADA2ODU2ZDBkLWYzNWItNGFhOC04ZmVmLWE0OTJiMmYzZWM5OABGAAAAAABGBw2b0skdSLjxkXc4kboFBwBNFUSRsW3TRIo6RTo9vvdQAAAAAAEPAABNFUSRsW3TRIo6RTo9vvdQAAME4vjtAAABEgAQANly%2BCM6JXNHqfA22Ll0ij0%3D&X-OWA-CANARY=0J1PphAeFkm0xI8kk1A3oyBF2M45NtcItu24aZLWnW0U6jdeP8x00UKzG4fkVuhu2IyqbCV5aw8."></span><span style="font-size: 12pt; color: rgb(16, 16, 16); font-family: "Cordia New", sans-serif;"></span></p>
<p style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt; font-size: 11pt;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; color: rgb(16, 16, 16); font-family: "Cordia New", sans-serif;"><a href="https://www.brookings.edu/blog/education-plus-development/" style="color: rgb(5, 99, 193); text-decoration: underline;"><span style="color: blue; text-decoration: none; font-family: "Cordia New", sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "Cordia New", sans-serif;">Education
Plus Development</span></span></a><span style="font-family: "Cordia New", sans-serif;">
</span></span></p>
<p style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt; font-size: 11pt;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; color: rgb(16, 16, 16); font-family: "Cordia New", sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "Cordia New", sans-serif;">August 9, 2019 - Adolescents, or young people between the
ages of 10 and 25, represent roughly 25 percent of the world’s total population. This population of
</span><a href="https://www.un.org/en/events/youthday/" style="color: rgb(5, 99, 193); text-decoration: underline;"><span style="color: blue; text-decoration: none; font-family: "Cordia New", sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "Cordia New", sans-serif;">1.8
billion individuals</span></span></a><span style="font-family: "Cordia New", sans-serif;"> makes up the largest adolescent population in modern history, placing adolescents at the center of global attention. While there are
</span><a href="https://www.vvob.org/sites/belgium/files/201905_vvob_tech_brief_adolescents_web_0.pdf" style="color: rgb(5, 99, 193); text-decoration: underline;"><span style="font-family: "Cordia New", sans-serif;"></span><span style="color: blue; text-decoration: none; font-family: "Cordia New", sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "Cordia New", sans-serif;">efforts</span></span></a><span style="font-family: "Cordia New", sans-serif;">
to enhance adolescent well-being, learning, and opportunities, much of the focus has been on early childhood education and post-secondary employability—the years in between are often largely ignored.
</span></span></p>
<p style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt; font-size: 11pt;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; color: rgb(192, 0, 0); font-family: "Cordia New", sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "Cordia New", sans-serif;">According to
</span><a href="https://www.unicef.org/adolescence/" style="color: rgb(5, 99, 193); text-decoration: underline;"><span style="color: rgb(192, 0, 0); text-decoration: none; font-family: "Cordia New", sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "Cordia New", sans-serif;">UNICEF</span></span></a><span style="font-family: "Cordia New", sans-serif;">:
“Young adolescents (aged 10-14) are often invisible in discourse and data, falling between policies and programmes focused on children and on youth</span></span><span style="font-size: 12pt; color: rgb(16, 16, 16); font-family: "Cordia New", sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "Cordia New", sans-serif;">.”
And, to the extent that youths do receive attention, it is often from a developmental deficit perspective.</span></span></p>
<p style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt; font-size: 11pt;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; color: rgb(16, 16, 16); font-family: "Cordia New", sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "Cordia New", sans-serif;">But, the adolescent years offer great promise. As stated
in the most recent report of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine, titled “</span><a href="https://www.nap.edu/catalog/25388/the-promise-of-adolescence-realizing-opportunity-for-all-youth" style="color: rgb(5, 99, 193); text-decoration: underline;"><span style="color: blue; text-decoration: none; font-family: "Cordia New", sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "Cordia New", sans-serif;">The
Promise of Adolescence: Realizing Opportunity for All Youth</span></span></a><span style="font-family: "Cordia New", sans-serif;">,” changes in adolescent brains—contrary to what is commonly believed—“present young people with unique opportunities for positive,
life-shaping development, and for recovery from past adversity.” In other words, this developmental period presents unique opportunities for youth to learn and grow in ways that can set a strong foundation for the rest of their lives.</span></span></p>
<p style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt; font-size: 11pt;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; color: rgb(16, 16, 16); font-family: "Cordia New", sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "Cordia New", sans-serif;">“During the teen years, our minds change in the way we remember,
think, reason, focus attention, make decisions, and relate to others. From around age twelve to age twenty-four, there is a burst of growth and maturation taking place as never before in our lives. Understanding the nature of these changes can help us create
a more positive and productive life journey.” – Daniel Seigel, Clinical Professor of Psychiatry at the UCLA School of Medicine</span></span></p>
<p style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt; font-size: 11pt;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; color: rgb(16, 16, 16); font-family: "Cordia New", sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "Cordia New", sans-serif;">Education can take advantage of the malleability of the
adolescent brain to bolster the cognitive, social, and emotional skills that can positively change the life trajectory of youths. While
</span><a href="https://casel.org/impact/" style="color: rgb(5, 99, 193); text-decoration: underline;"><span style="color: blue; text-decoration: none; font-family: "Cordia New", sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "Cordia New", sans-serif;">research</span></span></a><span style="font-family: "Cordia New", sans-serif;">
has shown long-term benefits of promoting social and emotional skills in youth, little is known about how these skills typically develop during the adolescent years. As the quote above states, understanding the nature of the changes, such as whether there
are predictable patterns of development, is key to designing appropriate interventions when they may be necessary.</span></span></p>
<p style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt; font-size: 11pt;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; color: rgb(16, 16, 16); font-family: "Cordia New", sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "Cordia New", sans-serif;">In order to better understand and inform
</span></span><span style="font-size: 12pt; color: rgb(192, 0, 0); font-family: "Cordia New", sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "Cordia New", sans-serif;">social and emotional learning (SEL)
</span></span><span style="font-size: 12pt; color: rgb(16, 16, 16); font-family: "Cordia New", sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "Cordia New", sans-serif;">programs for adolescents, the authors of this blog, along with colleagues at the University of Virginia,
examined </span><a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0193397318301837" style="color: rgb(5, 99, 193); text-decoration: underline;"><span style="color: blue; text-decoration: none; font-family: "Cordia New", sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "Cordia New", sans-serif;">normative
growth trajectories</span></span></a><span style="font-family: "Cordia New", sans-serif;"> of adolescents’ social and emotional skills. Three findings are worth noting, particularly to understand the development of these skills:</span></span></p>
<ol start="1" type="1" style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<li style="color: rgb(16, 16, 16); margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt; font-size: 11pt;"><b style="font-family: "Cordia New", sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Cordia New", sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "Cordia New", sans-serif;">SEL skill
development is dynamic</span></span></b><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Cordia New", sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "Cordia New", sans-serif;">. Social and emotional skills do not always follow a simple linear developmental trajectory.
That is, the expectation that adolescents should increasingly improve these skills over time is false. The decrease, increase, or even bell-shaped curve of these skills is all part of normal adolescent development that occurs as the
</span><a href="https://www.nap.edu/resource/25388/Adolescent%20Development.pdf" style="color: rgb(5, 99, 193); text-decoration: underline;"><span style="font-family: "Cordia New", sans-serif;"></span><span style="color: blue; text-decoration: none; font-family: "Cordia New", sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "Cordia New", sans-serif;">connections
between brain regions</span></span></a><span style="font-family: "Cordia New", sans-serif;"> become more efficient and specialized, depending on experiences.</span></span></li><li style="color: rgb(16, 16, 16); margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt; font-size: 11pt;"><b style="font-family: "Cordia New", sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Cordia New", sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "Cordia New", sans-serif;">Not all
social and emotional skills take the same developmental path.</span></span></b><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Cordia New", sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "Cordia New", sans-serif;"> In looking across five essential social and emotional
skills (self-awareness, self-management, responsible decisionmaking, forming relationships, and relationship quality), no two had the same growth pattern. Oftentimes, social and emotional skills are lumped together, as if all these skills were the same; however,
our research shows this is not the case. This means that, rather than assuming all skills develop similarly for all youth, teaching approaches and interventions may need to be differentiated depending on the skill.</span></span></li><li style="color: rgb(16, 16, 16); margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt; font-size: 11pt;"><b style="font-family: "Cordia New", sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Cordia New", sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "Cordia New", sans-serif;">Males
and females have different developmental trajectories.</span></span></b><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Cordia New", sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "Cordia New", sans-serif;"> Across all of the social and emotional skills we reviewed, there
were differences in the trajectories between males and females—in some cases, the difference was drastic. Figure 1 below illustrates this point. Note that the black line is for the overall sample; the red line for female-only sample; and the blue line for
the male-only sample. We know that there is an interplay between </span><a href="https://www.newamerica.org/in-depth/transforming-early-education-workforce/interaction-biology-and-environment/" style="color: rgb(5, 99, 193); text-decoration: underline;"><span style="font-family: "Cordia New", sans-serif;"></span><span style="color: blue; text-decoration: none; font-family: "Cordia New", sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "Cordia New", sans-serif;">biology
and environment</span></span></a><span style="font-family: "Cordia New", sans-serif;">, but this finding shows the importance of considering the nuanced association between social and emotional skills and the biological, cultural, and developmental factors
that influence their development.<br>
<br>
</span></span></li></ol>
<p style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt; font-size: 11pt;"><b style="font-family: "Cordia New", sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 13.5pt; color: rgb(16, 16, 16); font-family: "Cordia New", sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "Cordia New", sans-serif;">Figure
1. Growth trajectories for relationship quality</span></span></b></p>
<p style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt; font-size: 11pt;"><a href="https://www.brookings.edu/wp-content/uploads/2019/08/global_190809_youth_social_emotional_skills.png" style="color: rgb(5, 99, 193); text-decoration: underline;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; color: blue; text-decoration: none; font-family: "Cordia New", sans-serif;"><img 0?="" width="774" height="572" id="Picture_x0020_4" alt="Figure 1. Growth trajectories for relationship quality" style="width: 8.0625in; height: 5.9583in; user-select: none; font-family: "Cordia New", sans-serif;" src="service.svc/s/GetFileAttachment?id=AAMkADA2ODU2ZDBkLWYzNWItNGFhOC04ZmVmLWE0OTJiMmYzZWM5OABGAAAAAABGBw2b0skdSLjxkXc4kboFBwBNFUSRsW3TRIo6RTo9vvdQAAAAAAEPAABNFUSRsW3TRIo6RTo9vvdQAAME4vjtAAABEgAQAOgCDRPVuqhKh5ZmF9qpSQ8%3D&X-OWA-CANARY=0J1PphAeFkm0xI8kk1A3oyBF2M45NtcItu24aZLWnW0U6jdeP8x00UKzG4fkVuhu2IyqbCV5aw8."></span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; color: rgb(16, 16, 16); font-family: "Cordia New", sans-serif;"></span></p>
<p style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt; font-size: 11pt;"><i style="font-family: "Cordia New", sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; color: rgb(16, 16, 16); font-family: "Cordia New", sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "Cordia New", sans-serif;">Note:
Age centered at 10 years. The red line represents females; blue, males; and black, both together.</span></span></i><span style="font-size: 12pt; color: rgb(16, 16, 16); font-family: "Cordia New", sans-serif;"></span></p>
<p style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt; font-size: 11pt;"><i style="font-family: "Cordia New", sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; color: rgb(16, 16, 16); font-family: "Cordia New", sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "Cordia New", sans-serif;">Source:
Adapted from Ross, Kim, Tolan, & Jennings (2019). “An exploration of normative social and emotional skill growth trajectories during adolescence.” Journal of Applied Developmental Psychology, 62, 102-115.</span></span></i><span style="font-size: 12pt; color: rgb(16, 16, 16); font-family: "Cordia New", sans-serif;"></span></p>
<p style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt; font-size: 11pt;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; color: rgb(16, 16, 16); font-family: "Cordia New", sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "Cordia New", sans-serif;">Adolescent brains are unique and dynamic; they are optimally
designed to meet the many changes and challenges that youths encounter. </span></span><span style="font-size: 12pt; color: rgb(192, 0, 0); font-family: "Cordia New", sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "Cordia New", sans-serif;">Investing in better understanding
of how adolescents learn and develop is crucial to propelling them to greater success in adulthood.
</span></span><span style="font-size: 12pt; color: rgb(16, 16, 16); font-family: "Cordia New", sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "Cordia New", sans-serif;">Fighting inequalities in education and producing a highly skilled workforce for the upcoming decades
starts with early childhood education but cannot stop there. Until we better understand the adolescent brain, we must celebrate unpredictable and nonlinear youth development and appreciate this period of flexibility, ripe for learning and growth.</span></span></p>
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