Youth Workin' It

Consultancy and Resources for Youth Workers and Organizations Worldwide

Creating A Logic Model – Risk And Protective Factors

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Risk protective factors
What are the risk factors causing your youth to walk a tightrope?

We’re continuing our series on how to create a logic model for your youth work programs – you can find the different parts of the series below:

The key to all the stages of creating a logic model is research. National and local research through databases and local community research and input through forums, focus groups, questionnaires or town hall meetings.

Today we’re looking at the second stage of the basic logic model – identifying risk and protective factors.

Risk Factors

These are the reasons why a youth may be making poor choices or feeling helpless / hopeless and make them more likely to be at risk.

Protective factors

These are the people, experiences and beliefs that may help youth make better or more positive choices when they’re faced with challenges.

How These Impact Youth

Theoretically, the more risk factors and fewer protective factors a youth has, the ‘worse’ the behaviors / problems are that they’ll be likely to experience; conversely, the more protective factors and fewer risk factors in their life, the ‘better’ a youth’s choices will be.

It’s important to note that this isn’t an exact science. There are plenty of youth with a lot of risk factors and very few protective factors in their lives who thrive, while there are some young people who seemingly have every opportunity but choose to throw it away with their choices. By working with research-based factors, you’ll be able to make a general picture of the area that has some support to back it up – not just based on your opinion.

What Affects Risk And Protective Factors?

Risk and protective factors are affected by the age / developmental stage of the child or youth. Children are more resilient at different stages, so a risk factor of an absent parent may affect a small child and a young teen differently, thereby creating more or less of a sense of ‘risk’ for them.

Types Of Risk Factors

Additionally, there are different types of risk factors. Commonly they’re referred to as ‘individual, family and community (school / work)’ here in the US. It’s also similar to the PCS model that I encountered in the UK, in which the personal, community and societal beliefs, values and experiences shape a young person’s views and choices.

Continuing to use our previous example, the local data where I currently work shows that the top three behaviors and problems for youth are Teen Pregnancy, Substance Abuse and Low Graduation Rate. You can use a lot of different sites and resources to get the evidence-based risk and protective factors. I’ve just used a search on the web for the purposes of this example.

Teen Pregnancy

Substance Use

Low Graduation Rate

Here is the current update to our basic logic model including some risk and protective factors:

Basic Logic Model – Risk and Protective Factors

Next week we’ll look at the possible programs, events and interventions that may address the behaviors in your area.

Question: What are some of the risk and protective factors you’ve identified for young people in your local community? We’d love to hear about your research in the comments below.

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What Are The Implications For At Risk Youth?

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What are the implications for at risk youthQ: OK, so I work with at risk youth. What implications does this have and how should I deal with it?

A: Working with at risk youth will often have implications that aren’t always immediately obvious, but are important to bear in mind. For example:

  • Youth living in foster care or group homes – They will often have a hard time trusting people and forming close relationships, especially if they’ve moved homes numerous times. This can often lead to problems at school as they’ve had to change schools multiple times, meaning they fall behind on learning and don’t get to build lasting relationships with school friends
  • Abused youth – If you’re a youth pastor or volunteer youth worker in a church, young people who have been abused by their father may well have a hard time relating to God as a father
  • Youth from low-income families – They may have a hard time concentrating for no other reason than that they’re hungry. It might also mean they’re bullied due to not having nice clothing
  • Youth with learning difficulties – If your programs involve a lot of sitting around and reading, there’s a far higher likelihood that they will be disruptive. This isn’t because they’re naughty, but because they’re unable to fully participate. Try to be sensitive to this and take into account different learning styles
  • Youth with physical disabilities – Try to include games and activities that they can participate in, rather than them having to sit out while everyone else has fun

It’s therefore important to also know your organization’s policy on how to handle disclosures of abuse and steps you can take to promote child protection.

What are the longer term implications?

  • Sexually Transmitted Infections – Young people with high sexual activity are more susceptible to STIs
  • Unemployment – Youth who are at risk will often struggle at school for all manner of reasons. This can in turn lead to them finding it hard to get a job due to a lack of qualifications
  • Crime – If they’re unable to make a living, they may turn to crime to gain an income
  • Relationships – If a young person has had troubled relationships with their family – or no relationships at all if moving from foster home to foster home – it’s likely they’ll have trouble forming longer term relationships
  • Sexuality – LGBT youth are more likely to end up homeless than heterosexual young people and subsequently encounter further risks as a result of being homeless

Needless to say, we think it’s important to be aware of at risk youth and be sensitive to their needs. However, it’s also important to remember that just because they’re at risk, it doesn’t mean that there’s no hope for them. Therefore, be wary of labelling young people as this can result in a self-fulfilling prophecy.

Question: What other implications are there for at risk youth? Please share your ideas in the comments below.

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What Does “At Risk Youth” Mean?

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What does at risk youth meanQ: I’ve heard this term used about quite a lot of young people, but what does “at risk youth” mean?

A: At its most basic, it means youth who are at risk – surprising, huh?! But “at risk” of what?

There are many risk factors that can lead to hazards in young peoples’ lives:

  • Poverty
  • Abuse (physical, sexual, mental, etc)
  • Crime
  • Poor schools
  • Living in foster care, group homes, etc
  • Bullying
  • Disabilities
  • Unstable home life
  • Learning difficulties
  • Drugs
  • Alcohol
  • Mental health
  • Sexuality

In short, this could mean that pretty much all youth are – to some extent – at risk. Like risk assessments though, some young people will be in a far higher risk situation than others.

How are youth identified as being at risk?

All youth in their lives have both risk factors (such as those listed above) and protective factors. Having a higher number of risk factors and lower number of protective factors in their life are good indicators of whether they should be deemed an “at risk youth”.

Protective factors can include:

  • Stable home life
  • Encouraging parents
  • Scholastic ability
  • Good teachers
  • Safe neighborhood
  • Learning social skills
  • Being taught life skills
  • Healthy lifestyle
  • Good diet
  • Access to services

How can we tell if they’re at risk?

As youth workers, we should try to be aware of any youth in our programs who are at risk. Sometimes these young people will be easy to identify, particularly if you work with a group that are generally regarded as being in a higher risk situation, such as foster youth, young offenders or students in low-income areas.

It can therefore sometimes be harder for youth workers like youth pastors to know which of their young people are at risk. There are some signs though that could indicate that youth are in more hazardous living situations:

  • Highly sexualized behavior – Might indicate sexual abuse
  • Wearing same clothes / clothes don’t fit / clothes have holes – Might be living in poverty
  • Unwilling to read anything out – Might have learning difficulties (although could just be shyness)
  • Extremely aggressive – Might indicate abuse of some kind
  • Wears clothing that covers body, even in hot weather – Might suffer from physical abuse and so trying to cover bruises. This can also be a sign that they self-harm (covering up cuts/burns) or that they suffer from sexual abuse (don’t want to draw attention to their body)

Next week, we’ll look at some of the implications of working with at risk youth.

Question: Do you work with at risk youth? What advice would you give to other youth workers on how to deal with these situations? Please share your advice in the comments below.

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