Today, the most cutting-edge thinking about human development is holistic, dynamic, and emphasizes the relationship between the developing person and his or her context. This thinking is an important evolution; a stark contrast to outmoded ideas that see people as something to be molded by the context like a piece of clay or “filled” like an empty receptacle.
The Positive Youth Development (PYD) perspective is one such holistic and dynamic view, based on the ideas that:1
1. All young people have strengths (because of the potential for developmental change across the lifespan), and
2. All contexts have strengths as well. These strengths are resources that can be used to promote positive youth development.
3. If the strengths of young people are combined with the strengths of the context, then positive, healthy development occurs.
PYD emerges out of this dynamic relationship and is evidenced by the presence in young people of “Five C’s”: Competence, Confidence, Connection, Caring, and Character.
Digital contexts are becoming more prevalent in children’s lives than ever before, fueled in part by the COVID-19 pandemic and the need to move various aspects of children’s lives online.2 The growing presence of digital technology as a context for children’s development requires that we think deeply about its impact, identify its strengths, and consider how best to combine those strengths with the strengths of young people to promote their positive development.
Nutrient-rich digital contexts have many of the same features as those found in the physical world. Both are guided by a deep understanding of children’s development, behavior, and natural play patterns.3 Both also recognize social interactions as the core of what it means to be human, seeking to enhance and extend (not obstruct) human connection.4 In turn, both types of contexts empower children to be agents in their own development, to make choices and course-corrections, to be generative and creative.5
We know digital contexts support positive development when children exhibit these six positive behaviors:3
1. Communication (sharing ideas, caring about and interpreting the work of others)
2. Collaboration (turning shared ideas into shared action)
3. Community Building (contributing to the good of the community)
4. Content Creation (using tools to create new artifacts)
5. Creativity (being flexible and imaginative)
6. Choices of Conduct (making decisions based on one’s personal sense of morality)
Taken together, these behaviors can be used to guide the design of developmentally-mindful digital contexts and, as well, to evaluate and revamp existing digital contexts.
When we take a positive developmental approach to digital contexts, we recognize that the quality and potential benefits of those contexts are contingent upon children’s developmental milestones. Just as a child’s height determines the relevance of monkey bars, so too does their attention span, memory, symbolic representational skills and so on, determine the relevance and nutrient richness of digital contexts. Certain developments, particularly in early childhood, happen best in the physical, multidimensional world. Children must reach these key milestones to unlock and benefit from the strengths of digital contexts. When unlocked, the strengths of young people can combine with the strengths of digital contexts to support positive development.
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- Lerner, R. M., Lerner, J. V., Almerigi, J., Theokas, C., Phelps, E., Gestsdóttir, S. Naudeau, S., Jelicic, H., Alberts, A. E., Ma, L., Smith, L. M., Bobek, D. L., Richman-Raphael, D., Simpson, I., Christiansen, E. D., & von Eye, A. (2005). Positive youth development, participation in community youth development programs, and community contributions of fifth-grade adolescents: Findings from the first wave of the 4-H Study of Positive Youth Development. Journal of Early Adolescence, 25(1), 17-71.
- Responsible Innovation in Technology for Children. UNICEF Office of Research – Innocenti, Florence, 2022.
- Bers, M. U. (2012). Designing Digital Experiences for Positive Youth Development: From Playpen to Playground. Oxford, Cary, NC.
- Hirsh-Pasek, K., Zosh, J. M., Golinkoff, R. M., Gray, J. H., Robb, M. B., & Kaufman, J. (2015). Putting education in “educational” apps: Lessons from the science of learning. Psychological Science in the Public Interest, 16(1), 3-34.
- Lerner, R. M., Theokas, C., & Jelicic, H. (2005). Youth as active agents in their own positive development: A developmental systems perspective. In W. Greve, K. Rothermund, & D. Wentura (Eds.). The adaptive self: Personal continuity and intentional self-development (pp. 31-47). Göttingen, Germany: Hogrefe & Huber Publishers.
Amy Warren, Ph.D. is a Senior Child Development Researcher at Fluent Research. Amy holds a Bachelor of Arts in psychology from Clark University and M.A. and Ph.D. degrees in child development from Tufts University. Dan Warren, Ph.D. is Director, Youth Development and Education at Fluent Research. Dan holds a doctorate in Human Development and Child Study from Tufts University and taught elementary school in Massachusetts for nearly a decade. Together, they co-founded Home Base Learning Center, a nature-based elementary school guided by the core values of Positive Youth Development, Social Justice, and Earth Stewardship.
