Empathy in an ecosystem: A longitudinal study examining contributions of summer camp and school experiences to empathy during early adolescence

Abstract

This study utilized data from a national longitudinal study of 277 early adolescent summer camp participants to examine the iterative links between youths’ experiences in two contexts – summer camp and school – and empathy over two years. Using a cross-lagged panel model, the authors examined how the quality of youths’ developmental experiences within each context, defined as a combination of supportive relationships and engaged learning opportunities, were related to youths’ empathy over time. Results showed that 1) higher quality developmental experiences in each context uniquely predicted improvements in empathy; 2) youths’ developmental experiences at camp and school were mutually reinforcing over time; and 3) school experiences partly mediated the effects of camp experiences and vice versa. Results illustrate the value of out-of-school-time contexts for supporting empathy, the importance of developmental experiences across settings, and the need for researchers and practitioners to attend to the ecosystem of social development.

Acknowledgements

The authors would like to express thanks to Laurie Browne from the American Camp Association, who played a major role in coordinating the Camp Impact Study, and to Dan Richmond, who led much of the measurement preparation and data collection work for the study during his time as a post-doctoral research associate at the University of Utah.

Authors’ contributions

Jim Sibthorp led the study conception and design in consultation with a volunteer research advisory committee, of which Thomas Akiva was a member. The preparation of study materials and data collection were led by Jim Sibthorp and Robert Lubeznik-Warner. Robert Lubeznik-Warner performed data analysis, with support from Bryn Spielvogel. Bryn Spielvogel led manuscript preparation with contributions from Robert Lubeznik-Warner. All authors participated in reviewing the manuscript and providing feedback. All authors read and approved the final manuscript.

Employment

Robert Lubeznik-Warner became a contracted consultant for the American Camp Association after the completion of this study.

Nonfinancial interests

Thomas Akiva served as an unpaid volunteer of the American Camp Association Research Advisory Board for the Camp Impact Study, from which the data for this study were drawn.

Ethical approval

This study (IRB_00112304) was approved by the University of Utah institutional review board.

Informed consent

Informed consent was obtained from all participants.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Data, materials, and/or code availability

Data are not publicly available at present. Analysis code is available upon request.

Notes

1 Due to the influence of the COVID-19 pandemic on camp attendance beginning in the summer of 2020, the data presented in this study involves only data collected in the first five waves of the study, from summer 2018 - spring 2020.

2 No youth were reported to be gender non-conforming at baseline.

3 While it is not preferable to collapse racial/ethnic identities in this way given unique cultures, histories, and experiences within and across racial/ethnic communities, the composition of the given sample meant that we had insufficient statistical power to detect meaningful differences between non-White racial/ethnic identities. Rather than excluding race/ethnicity altogether, we elected to include a dichotomous version to help account for structural privileges that white youth experience in the world.

4 Due to the application of equality constraints on the unstandardized data, there is some variation in the magnitude of standardized path coefficients across constrained paths.

Additional information

Funding

This study was funded by a grant from the American Camp Association (grant no. ACA 2017-01) and The Spencer Foundation (Research-Practice Partnership grant no. 201700088).