Gains in youth resilience during self-driven learning may be moderated by their pathways to purpose

ABSTRACT

Research suggests a sense of purpose begins developing in earnest during adolescence, which may shape youth’s interests and resilience. Here, we explored the types of purpose orientations reflected in youth’s applications to a self-driven learning program, and how distinct pathways by which youth pursued these purposes moderated their resilience throughout the program. A content analysis of 356 youth’s (M_age = 16.53, 57.02% female) descriptions of and rationales for choosing their learning topics found that career, creative, and prosocial purposes were the most prevalent; and about 70% of participants indicated following proactive pathways toward purposes. Moreover, youth’s resilience significantly increased throughout the program, a pattern amplified among youth whose applications revealed a proactive purpose pathway (gradually developing and pursuing an interest) relative to reactive or social-learning pathways. Findings underscore important links between purpose pathways and resilience and have implications for designing learning opportunities that facilitate positive youth development.

KEYWORDS:

• Purpose pathway
• purpose orientation
• adolescents
• resilience
• self-driven learning
• positive youth development

Acknowledgments

This work is supported by the Silicon Valley Community Foundation under grant number 136823. Any findings, opinions, or recommendations expressed in this paper are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of the funding agency. The authors are indebted to Mark Murphy, Catherine Holland, and Melody Estevez for initiating and operating the GripTape project. We would like to acknowledge Grace Ann DeVivo, an undergraduate research assistant at the Purpose and Identity Processes Laboratory, Cornell University, for assisting the content analysis. We also like to thank all the incredible participants who allowed us to explore a new form of learning and made this research possible.

Disclosure statement

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

Data availability

Derived data supporting the findings of this study are available from the corresponding author upon reasonable request and with the permission of GripTape.

Ethical approval

The data set was collected by the GripTape team (https://griptape.org/) for internal evaluation and future research purposes. The participants signed agreements and were informed that their data would be anonymous when shared with anyone outside the GripTape team. The Institutional Review Board at the authors’ university exempted the ethics protocol review because we do not have access to the private identifiable information of the participants nor any master list that would allow the re-identification of the data.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the Silicon Valley Community Foundation [136823].