Positive Individual and Social Behavior among Gang and Nongang African American Male Adolescents

Abstract

To explore potential bases of positive development among gang youth, attributes of positive individual and social behavior were assessed in individual interviews with 45 African American adolescent male members of inner-city Detroit gangs and 50 African American adolescent males from the same communities but involved in community-based organizations aimed at promoting positive youth development. As anticipated, the groups differed in regard to the majority of interview questions and to positive attribute scores pertaining to parents/family, peer relations, school/education, drug use, sexual activity, religious activities/religiosity, racial/ethnic identity, role models/confidants, and neighborhood/safety. The correlations of attributes scores were more often significant (i.e., coupled) for the gang than for the nongang youth. Consistent with the ideas that all young people have resources pertinent to positive development and that, therefore, gang and nongang youth would have some resource comparability, across the nine attributes, about one quarter of the gang youth had total positive attribute scores that were above the average total positive attribute score for the nongang youth. Implications of these findings for both research and applications to programs seeking to promote positive youth development among diverse youth are discussed.