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40 Developmental Assets
What are Develeopmental Assets?
Building Blocks for Raising Healthy Children and Youth
Since its creation in 1990, Search Institute’s framework of Developmental Assets has become the most widely used approach to positive youth development in the United States.
Background — Grounded in extensive research in youth development, resiliency, and prevention, the Developmental Assets represent the relationships, opportunities, and personal qualities that young people need to avoid risks and to thrive.
The Power of Assets — Studies of more than 2.2 million young people in the United States consistently show that the more assets young people have, the less likely they are to engage in a wide range of high-risk behaviors and the more likely they are to thrive. Assets have power for all young people, regardless of their gender, economic status, family, or race/ethnicity. Furthermore, levels of assets are better predictors of high-risk involvement and thriving than poverty or being from a single-parent family.
The Gap — The average young person experiences fewer than half of the 40 assets. Boys experience three fewer assets than girls (17.2 assets for boys vs. 19.9 for girls).
Kids who build assets and connections with home and community have more of a chance to succeed in later in life than those whose parents indulge them and try to provide the assets themselves: this is the message of a strong title encouraging parents to work with the community. "What Kids Need" is a book based not on theory, but on a nationwide study; and which presents not generalities, but 50 proven paths for success.
Peter L. Benson, Ph.D., has been president of Search Institute since 1985. He received his Ph.D. in social psychology from the University of Denver, his M.A. in psychology from Yale, and his B.A. in psychology from Augustana College.
Judy Galbraith, M.A., has a master’s degree in guidance and counseling of the gifted. She has worked with and taught gifted children and teens, their parents, and their teachers for over 20 years.
The authors of "What Teens Need to Succeed" based their writing on surveys of over 350,000 U.S. teens to provide a unique look at "positive assets" - good things that contribute to an individual's success in life. External assets include families, peers, spiritual support systems, schools, neighborhoods and their wider communities, while internal assets are defined as motivation, honesty, responsibility, decision-making skills, resistance skills, and more. Quotations from other Free Spirit self-help books and Search Institute findings are significant parts of this title, as are charts, graphs, quizzes, checklists, facts and statistics, illustrative and factual anecdotes, and myriad resources (Web sites, books, pamphlets, and contact organizations). A useful resource for teens and those who work with them.
