Developing a Coherent Approach to Youth Well-Being in the Fields of Child Welfare, Juvenile Justice, Education, and Health: A Systematic Literature Review

Abstract

This article summarizes the results from a systematic literature review of the published research on youth well-being in the child welfare, juvenile justice, education, and public health systems. The review identifies areas to address among researchers and practitioners in order to create a coherent and coordinated approach for improving youth well-being across child-serving systems. Although each of these separate systems all serve youth populations, the results suggest that each system (and the research field that supports it) differ with one another to a large degree on how to (a) operationalize well-being, (b) support its development, (c) measure its presence, and (d) train the workforce to sustain outcomes over time. Implications for research and practice are discussed.