may challenge assumptions regarding neighbourhood social processes. Studies based on this theory would, for example, explore the role of adolescent prosocial behaviour within a neighbourhood context and health and well-being. Studies by Morrow (1999) and Spilsbury and Korbin (2004) have taken a more positive approach to understanding the effects of social organisation and support the view that there is no single standard measure of a healthy neighbourhood, but that neighbourhoods are complex and internally quite heterogeneous and that there tends to be more variability within neighbourhoods than across neighbourhoods (Cook et al., 1997). When
researching social capital the measures need to be built from a strong theoretical foundation and include other contexts such as peers and the family.
2.4.2 A Framework for the effects of social capital on adolescent health and well-being
Social capital is hypothesised to affect health and well-being in a number of ways, first at the individual level. Social capital impacts directly on an individual’s heath by affecting a person’s attributes and activities. A community with more social capital is likely to provide more social support and opportunities for bonding and social
engagement. These may positively affect physiological stress responses, self-esteem and health behaviours (Berkman, Glass, Brissette & Seeman, 2000). A meta-analysis of research into the effects of neighbourhoods and child and adolescent outcomes by Leventhal and Brooks-Gunn, (2000) highlighted the importance of social organisation, concluding that its absence results in a range of problems influencing educational, emotional and health outcomes. The effects include internalizing disorders (Xue, Leventhal, Brooks-Gunn & Earls, 2005) and obesity (Cohen, Bower, & Sastry, 2006). These effects are described as ‘compositional’ health effects of social capital
39 Secondly social capital may influence health indirectly through influencing larger environmental factors which in turn influence a community’s health. These ‘contextual' effects of social capital may affect health by influencing the types of jobs available and housing in the area. Kawachi (1999) suggested social capital is a mediator in the relationships between SES and health.
A third mechanism at a group level is the influence of social capital on population health and well-being. Social capital may affect communities by enabling them to impact on the neighbourhood crime levels and further health enhancing environmental factors including the use of available green space. However most research in this area has focused on disadvantage areas, concluding that neighbourhood
characteristics can adversely affect local social capital, in turn affecting health (Cattell, 2001). Therefore few conclusions can be made about social capital and the potentially beneficial effects on health in more advantaged neighbourhoods (Forest & Kearns, 2001). Most neighbourhood studies are deficient in exploring the relationship between social capital and health including the need to study multiple perspectives and research methods including the role of volunteering and peers in developing social capital.
Neighbourhood collective efficacy has been identified as an important mechanism for understanding a wide range of health outcomes among children and adolescents (Sampson, 2003). Neighbourhood collective efficacy has also been associated with anti-social outcomes in adults e.g. partner violence (Browning, 2002) with collective efficacy having a regulatory effect. Studies have found collective efficacy has a protective effect on children growing up in deprived neighbourhoods (Odgers et al., 2009). The levels of informal social control and cohesion within a deprived
neighbourhood may help to buffer the harmful effects of deprivation on adolescents. As children mature, neighbourhood effects are likely to be communicated through multifaceted, age dependent pathways (Ingoldsby & Shaw, 2002). Parenting practices
40 may vary in tandem with the levels of neighbourhood collective efficacy. Rankin and Quane, (2002) suggested there is higher parental monitoring in neighbourhoods with higher collective efficacy and this signalled shared norms and values. This study suggested parental monitoring can be part of living in a socially organised neighbourhood or as a response to neighbourhoods exhibiting more crime and antisocial behaviour and be seen as a protective effect for adolescents against negative peers.
Culture and adolescent ethnic identity may result in social capital being perceived differently and researchers need to be particularly careful when interpreting social capital data within a multicultural environment. Putnam (2000) suggested that in the short to medium term immigration and ethnic diversity challenges social solidarity and inhibits social capital. People living in multicultural neighbourhoods may hold different values and ways of networking and bridging than in other areas. The complexity is further highlighted by studies exploring perceptions of social capital in different cultural settings. Drukker and colleagues (Drukker, Kaplan, Feron, & van Os, 2003) in a study investigating social capital and young adolescents’ perceived health in the
Netherlands and the US found different interpretations of social capital. Firstly the model in Scandinavia of a caring state aims to prevent various forms of social
exclusion for families e.g. housing for underprivileged families are spread throughout a city. In the US (Chicago), they argued a culture of individualism which prizes independence, influences social capital through a housing policy which concentrates disadvantaged families in large housing estates. The authors argued the more mixed Scandinavian neighbourhoods may explain the greater variation in Informal Social Control (ISC) compared to the ISC in Chicago. The authors note the effects of social capital could have been the result of family level control and cohesion rather than neighbourhood social capital which highlights the importance of including as many different contexts as possible.
41 Adolescents’ from different ethnic groups may differ in their perspectives concerning social capital; due to different norms e.g. Asian groups may have strong extended family structures across a neighbourhood. This may results in biased estimates of social capital. Almeida and colleagues (Almeida, Kawachi, Molnar, & Subramanian, 2009) found in a study in Chicago non-Latino whites had a significant higher
assessment of the level of social cohesiveness than all other ethnic groups.
Examining the different factors involved is important as Subramanian & colleagues (Subramanian, Lochner, & Kawachi, 2003) noted, perceptions of social cohesion may vary from one specific ethnic geographical neighbourhood to another of similar composition. The alternative ways in which young people understand experience and invest in their identities and networks will affect how they respond to bridging and bonding social capital (Weller 2010). More comparative cross-national research would help understanding concerning the mechanisms involved in social capital and
influences on adolescent health and well-being.
2.5 Relationships
2.5.1 Parents
A considerable body of research suggests a powerful role for parenting behaviour in predicting child outcomes, especially with reference to anti-social behaviour, alcohol and substance (IAS, 2010; Dishion & Bullock, 2002). The research suggests parenting is also an important moderator of the relation between neighbourhood quality and problem behaviour (Trentacosta, Hyde, Shaw, & Cheong 2009). However, there is disagreement concerning the importance of parenting and its effect on child outcomes (Maccoby 2000). Some studies argue the effects of monitoring in relation to other influences are small (Dick, Viken, Purcell, Kaprio, Pulkkinen, & Rose, 2007). In this Finnish twin family design, the authors studied the role of parental monitoring on adolescent smoking. They found in families with high parental monitoring,
42 environmental influences were predominant in the etiology of adolescent smoking, but with low parental monitoring, genetic influences assumed far greater importance in predicting smoking behaviour. The authors concluded the aetiology of adolescent smoking varies as a function of parenting.
It has been argued that in disadvantaged neighbourhoods two processes may explain the adverse impact of the neighbourhood on the lives of children. In the first process, neighbourhood characteristics influence families which results in adverse parenting which leads to child behaviour problems, or secondly the stress of family poverty leads to living in poorer neighbourhoods that leads to a potential for child abuse and affects children’s well-being (Korbin, Coulton, Chard, Platt-Houston & Su, 1998). Several empirical studies have linked neighbourhood characteristics to harsh and controlling parenting practices. Earls, McGuire and Shay (1994) found that parents who reported living in a more dangerous neighbourhood also reported using more harsh control and verbal aggression with their children compared to parents in less dangerous neighbourhoods. Ethnographic studies have also found parents in low SES neighbourhoods use stringent parenting strategies, such as confining adolescents to the home and accompanying adults on their daily trips around the neighbourhood in order to protect them (Burton & Jarrett, 2000; Furstenberg, 1993). Some studies have concluded that these strategies may benefit young people in poor neighbourhoods (Burton & Jarrett, 2000; Simons, Simons, Burt, Brody, & Cutrona, 2005). The reason for this may be that parents who use harsh discipline keep adolescents away from dangerous neighbourhood activities e.g. anti-social behaviour.
Clearly parents and the wider family are important in protecting adolescents from adverse influences in the neighbourhood. The parental characteristics thought to influence neighbourhood effects on youth are mental health, irritability, physical health, coping skills, and efficacy (Leventhal & Brooks-Gunn, 2000). Two more detailed examples are a study which found high parental responsiveness and high
43 behavioural control, and low psychological control were generally related to lower substance abuse and delinquency. In the second example, a study found positive associations between high maternal responsiveness and high behavioural control were negatively associated with child problem behaviour (Soenens, Vansteenkiste, Luyckx & Goosens, 2006). The influence of parents on adolescent health and well- being is complex, and clarifying the direct and indirect effect of parents on youth is important (e.g. Lachausse, 2008).