Abstract
The present work seeks to contribute to studies of cross-cultural risk and resiliency by presenting results from qualitative research with adolescents attending programs for at-risk youth in Juiz de Fora, Brazil. In 1990, Brazil introduced the Child and Adolescent Act (ECA), a significant piece of legislation that has had a direct impact on how at-risk youth are conceptualized both nationally and locally, through programs that target them. Little, however, is known about how youth in Brazil understand risk behaviors, what factors they believe contribute to risk taking or what they believe promotes resiliency. Furthermore, virtually no qualitative information exists on adolescents who are engaged in programs that use ECA as a prioritizing principle. By examining adolescent perspectives on risk and resiliency in such a context, we highlight the cultural differences in how youth negotiate their daily lives and the implications that continued exclusion of youth has on Brazilian society.
Introduction
Most adolescent morbidity and mortality is preventable and due to underlying behavioral causes, such as drug/alcohol use, unprotected sex, and smoking (Eaton et al., 2010). These behaviors have been linked to adverse social conditions (e.g., poverty, abuse) that place youth at-risk for risky behavior and negative health outcomes (Blum et al., 2000; Stoltz et al., 2007; Swahn & Bossarte, 2009). Recent research on adolescent risk behaviors has emphasized a resiliency approach in which interventions draw on young peoples’ competencies to help them make healthier decisions and navigate difficulties they may encounter as they grow and engage in different opportunities (Damon, 2004). Studies using the resiliency framework depart from traditional top-down approaches to addressing adolescent risk behaviors by focusing on youth-centered work that engages adolescents as partners in their health care and health behaviors (e.g., Bernstein, Graczyk, Lawrence, Bernstein, & Strunin, 2011). Resiliency studies are therefore uniquely positioned to capture adolescents’ perspectives on risk behaviors.
Traditional studies of risk and resiliency focused on how individual, social, or environmental protective factors or processes allow some individuals to adapt to adverse conditions (Anthony, 1987; Garmezy, 1983, 1991; Rutter, 1985; Werner, 1996). These studies were limited in how they conceptualized risk vis-à-vis the individual’s particular constitution or competence in negotiating risk (Fergus & Zimmerman, 2005; Ungar, 2004; Ungar et al., 2007). More recent studies, therefore, emphasize the need to understand risk behaviors and resiliency as context dependent. In other words, factors that promote resiliency are not universal; youth can demonstrate great resiliency in some areas, but not in others. Furthermore, behaviors considered risky in some contexts, may actually prove protective in others (Fergus & Zimmerman, 2005).
A growing body of literature has begun to examine adolescents risk behaviors and resiliency from the vantage point of different cultures both within and outside of the United States to highlight some of the variances in how risk is negotiated (Chamratrithirong et al., 2010; Kaufman et al., 2007; Parsai, Voisine, Marsiglia, Kulis, & Nieri, 2009; Roberts, Oyun, Batnasan, & Laing, 2005; Springer, Parcel, Baumler, & Ross, 2006; Teva, Berm dez, & Buela-Casal, 2010). For example, Ungar et al. (2007) in their study of 11 different cultures found that while certain forms of adversity were common across all study sites, no one pathway or factor leading to resiliency existed. Understanding adolescents’ perspectives in different cultural contexts is essential to developing better, more nuanced models for risk prevention and promoting positive health outcomes in diverse settings. In this article, we present a case study of youth perspectives on risk behaviors and resiliency in Brazil.
Youth Risk Behaviors: Brazilian Context
In the past 20 years, Brazil has undergone significant sociopolitical changes that have had a direct impact on how youth, particularly those considered at-risk, are conceptualized both nationally and at the local level. In 1990 Brazil ratified into its constitution the Child and Adolescent Act (ECA; Estatuto da criança e do adolescente, 1990), which aimed to refocus Brazilian youth-oriented policy toward the need to protect all children and adolescents and their rights in order to guarantee them a future place in Brazilian society. The act sought to create an integrated system of legal protections for young people deemed at-risk of having their human rights and rights as a citizen violated and implemented a series of laws and policies intended to protect youth from exploitation, abandonment, and other potentially adverse situations (de Almeida Dias, Sieben, Cozer, Alves, & Haubert, 2008). ECA restructured Brazilian youth policies away from previous approaches that had relied on punitive tactics that criminalized youth and instead created more socioeducative programs for youth as an approach for reducing engagement in risk behaviors (Rizzini, 2000, 2011). This is an example of resiliency work that has resulted in both the restructuring of existing organizations and development of new institutions to implement sports, leisure and arts-based initiatives, vocational training, and educational support programs targeting at-risk youth (Morrison, 2010; Rizzini, Barker, & Cassaniga, 2002).
Despite these increased efforts, Brazil continues to face challenges in terms of adolescent risk behaviors and health. In 2009, young people ages 13 to 24 accounted for roughly 35% of all new HIV/AIDS cases in Brazil (Ministério da Saúde, 2009), with a higher overall prevalence among those with lower levels of education. Although pregnancy rates among young women ages 15 to 19 have declined slightly, this age group still makes up nearly 20% of all new births (Instituto Brasileiro de Geografia Estatística, 2009). Even more troubling is the fact that homicide continues to be the leading cause of death among adolescent and young adult males in the country (Instituto Brasileiro de Geografia Estatística, 2009). Furthermore, although limited in scope, a growing body of independent research shows that young people in Brazil commonly engage in substance use (drugs and alcohol), risky sexual behaviors (lack of contraception use, sex in exchange for material needs, or prostitution), street use (living and/or working on the street), and involvement gangs or violence (Bertoni et al., 2009; Cardoso & Verner, 2008; Carlini-Cotrim, Gazal-Carvalho, & Gouveia, 2000; Carlini-Marlatt, Gazal-Carvalho, Gouveia, & Souza, 2003; de Carvalho et al., 2006; Farias Júnior et al., 2009; McLennan, Bordin, Bennett, Rigato, & Brinkerhoff, 2008; Silva et al., 2006; Verner, Alda, & Bank, 2004). These behaviors have been linked to high rates of sexually transmitted infections, unintended pregnancy, sexual exploitation, sexual and physical violence, suicidal ideation, death, and homelessness among youth (Anteghini, Fonseca, Ireland, & Blum, 2001; Calazans, Araujo, Venturi, & França, 2005; de Godoy Martins & de Mello Jorge, 2009; Farias Júnior, Mendes, & Barbosa, 2007; Martins & Jorge, 2010; Martins & Pillon, 2008; Peres et al., 2008; Schenker & Minayo, 2005).
Little qualitative information, however, exists regarding how adolescents in Brazil understand risk behaviors, what factors they believe contribute to their risk taking or what they believe might promote resiliency (Dalsgaard, Franch, & Scott, 2008; Sanchez, Oliveira, & Nappo, 2005), and the intersection between their perspectives and recent sociopolitical changes in the country. In fact, to date only one study qualitatively examines risk taking from the perspective of youth labeled as “at-risk” in Brazil (Sanchez et al., 2005). Sanchez et al. (2005), in their study of substance use among adolescents, found that access to information about the long term effects of drug use and family structure promoted abstinence from substance use. However, this study focus is limited to psychotropic drug use. The present work seeks to contribute to cross-cultural studies of resiliency by qualitatively exploring which factors contribute to a wide range of risk behaviors and which promote resiliency from the perspective of adolescents attending programs for at-risk youth in Juiz de Fora, Brazil.
Method
Overview
This study was conducted using a qualitative approach, as little is known about this subject matter. For the purpose of this study, risk was broadly defined as any factor or behavior that has potential adverse health consequences for youth. This definition was considered appropriate for two main reasons: first, the majority of the programs in Juiz de Fora for at-risk youth are not behavior specific and second, youth participating in these programs often exhibit more than one risk behavior.
Setting
Data for this study were collected as part of the first author’s doctoral research in 2008 with six organizations in Juiz de Fora that work with at-risk youth. Juiz de Fora is located in the state of Minas Gerais in the southeastern region of Brazil. Its population is approximately 520,000 with youth ages 10 to 19 years comprising 20% of the population, making this age group the largest in the city (Centro de Pesquisas Sociais, 2009). In 2009, 36% of all births registered in Juiz de Fora were attributed to young women ages 15 to 24, nearly half of all new reported HIV/AIDS were attribute to males in the same age range, and 52% of youth between the ages 15 and 17 were either not enrolled in secondary school or enrolled in a grade that did not correspond to where they ideally should be for their age. Thus, the city faces a number of challenges related to its youth population (Centro de Pesquisas Sociais, 2009).
Youth participants were recruited from programs run by six local nonprofit organizations that targeted at-risk youth. They typically arrived at these programs in one of two ways. Some youth are mandated into participation by the local juvenile council, an entity responsible for dealing with youth who are in trouble with the law for a variety of reasons including, but not limited to, public intoxication, drug possession/trafficking or drug use, sexual solicitation, truancy and violence and which often directs youth to such programs as an alternative to corporal punishment. Other youth are identified by their schools, parents or social workers as someone who could benefit from the programs and are thus, voluntarily enrolled. Though youth rarely arrive at the programs through their own initiative, almost all are aware that their involvement with the programs is predicated on some behavior or circumstance that has been identified as making them susceptible to adverse health or social outcomes.
Organizations were selected for recruitment of youth for this study based on several factors. First, the majority of the programs in Juiz de Fora take a holistic approach to risk, targeting youth risk taking in a broad context; thus, the organizations had to sponsor programs explicitly for at-risk youth in their mission statements and their promotional materials. Second, program based, as opposed to service oriented, organizations were selected; meaning they engaged youth in activities, rather than providing assistance, such as free health care or legal council. Third, organizations had to have a core of coed youth, 12 to 17 years, who were regularly attending the organization; those organizations that were gender specific or had youth younger than 12 or older than 17 were not sampled. Fourth, organizations were selected to represent a range of programs in terms of size (i.e., number of participating youth) and kinds programs offered. Two organizations offered vocational training programs, two offered sports and leisure programs, and two offered a range of programs, including arts, sports, educational support, and vocational training. Finally, due to the nature of working with youth and issues regarding entrée into a foreign community, the organizations had to be able to support the first author as a volunteer within the organization for an extended period of time as she developed rapport with youth and identified potential participants.
Data Collection and Study Participants
Data collection involved in-depth interviews of informants and was conducted in two phases. The first phase consisted of 2 months of preliminary participation in organizational activities conducted simultaneously at all 6 organizations. During this 2-month period, the author spent 1 day a week at each organization helping with everyday activities, including organizing youth activities and helping staff with daily administrative tasks. The purpose of this initial work was threefold: first, it allowed the author to develop relationships and build rapport with youth at each organization; second, initial data collection from field notes were used to identify culturally specific risk-related concepts to be used in the development of semistructured interview guides; third, it was during this time period that the author also began to identify a group of youth informants whom she could engage in in-depth interviews.
The second phase consisted of collection of semistructured interviews from identified main informants. A purposeful sample of 15 female and 15 male youths, 5 from each organization, were approached for participation in the in-depth interviews. Youth were selected if they were between the ages of 12 to 17, attended programs at one or more of the target organizations, and were willing to engage in the interviews. Youth were purposefully selected to represent a diversity of socioeconomic, racial and ethnic backgrounds, and sex. Youth informants were provided modest compensation for their participation in the study in the form of snacks, lunch, or other food goods.
Interview questions were designed with the help of organization staff to solicit information regarding what conditions youth felt lead to risk behaviors, how they defined risk, and what factors could promote resiliency. The interview guide consisted of 20 open-ended questions to allow for an in-depth exploration of youth’s attitudes and opinions. Main concepts were probed through the following questions: What does being at-risk mean to you? Who is an “at-risk” youth? Why do you think youth engage in behaviors, such as drug use, gang activity, or unprotected sex? What factors do you think contribute to such behaviors? What kinds of things do youth like yourself need to keep you from engaging in such behaviors?
Analysis
Analysis of data was informed by the understanding that risk-taking behaviors are part of adolescents’ social and developmental growth process and can have variable meanings both within and across populations of young people (Wexler, DiFluvio, & Burke, 2009). Furthermore, analysis drew on anthropological perspectives on youth agency that seek to situate youth both as independent actors engaged in cognitive interpretations of their social worlds and as referents for the process of socialization (Hart, 2006; Montgomery, 2008). Interview data were audiotaped, transcribed verbatim into Portuguese, and translated from Portuguese into English by the first author who is fluent in Brazilian Portuguese. Interview and field note data were then organized in Atlas.Ti, a qualitative data management program.
A single coder schema was considered appropriate for this research for two main reasons. First, the data were collected as part of a participatory research project in which the first author was embedded in the organizations where youth were surveyed; thus, triangulation was achieved through comparison of data collected from different methods in the field, including field notes, observations of and interactions with both the youth and organization staff, interviews with staff and participation in organization activities (Patton, 1999). Second, rather than producing generalizable results, the authors wished to qualitatively explore themes related to the social condition of risk, a concept that changes meaning across populations and cultures, and to develop a more culturally nuanced understanding of resiliency among the sample population.
The coding process, therefore, involved three steps. First, through preliminary fieldwork, initial themes and categories relevant to the research were identified. The written transcripts were then reviewed line-by-line to validate observations and refine thematic categories, helping to order the data conceptually. This resulted in a list of words and phrases representing themes. The author then reviewed the initial list of themes for each set of data and created a codebook that organized the themes into hierarchical categories. Definitions were delineated for each major and minor theme to assist in the final coding step. In the final step, the author independently recoded each interview transcript using the codebook. Reported themes are those that arose consistently across all participants.
All interviews were conducted by the first author at participating organizations in a private space provided by organizational staff. Each interview lasted between 45 and 70 min. Parental consent was waived and verbal assent from the youth participants obtained. This decision was intended to ensure adequate recruitment and minimize the potential for negative consequences due to study participation. First, many of the youth participants in this study come from unstructured households where parents and/or a legal guardian may be absent or where conditions of abuse, neglect or other adverse situations may have made parental consent impossible, thus limiting enrollment. Similarly, as Wagener et al. (2004) have shown research related to risk often results in insufficient numbers due to the fact that many youth do not wish for their parents to find out about the behaviors they are engaging in; thus, even if parents were present in the home, a waiver of parental consent was considered necessary to protect youth’s privacy, and minimize fear of exposure or harm or punishment within the household. The institutional review board at the University of Pittsburgh approved this study.
Results
Sample Characteristics
Demographic characteristics of the study sample are shown in Table 1. The average age of youth who engaged in interviews was 15 years. All youth were Brazilian-born and native to the Juiz de Fora region. Due to the problematic nature of racial identification in Brazil, participants were asked to self-report their race. Twelve (40%) identified being Morena or “Brown,” eight (27%) identified as Afro-Brazilian or Black, six (20%) identified as mixed racial heritage, and the remaining (13%) identified as White.
Sample Characteristics.
Note: N = 30.
Themes
Youth participants were queried about what conditions youth felt lead to risk behaviors, how they defined risk, and what factors could promote resiliency. The dominant themes and illustrative quotes for each of these domains are detailed in the following paragraphs.
Risk Factors
Family structure
Youth articulated three main factors that they felt contributed to their engagement in risk behaviors. First, 26 youth identified a lack of structure at home as a factor that contributed to behaviors such as substance abuse, violence, and sexual risk taking. For example, a young man (age 14) who had been caught using marijuana behind his school, when asked about drug use, stated, “. . . It is a lack of upbringing . . . Everything goes back to the family, to the parents.”
Similarly, a young woman (age 16) in discussing a friend who was pregnant stated, . . . It is a lack of a familial base . . . I have a friend who is pregnant, you understand? She’s only 14. Her parents don’t raise her, they just fight . . . If you want to change a young person, you have to look in the family . . .
Some also interjected the issue of class into their discussion of the family, carefully pointing out that socioeconomic status was irrelevant to how one was raised. As a young woman (age 16) who had been getting into fights at school suggested, You can be rich or poor . . . but parents show the way . . . my grandmother she wasn’t poor [but she] . . . she sent my uncle to live in the street at 14 and he began to use drugs, he became violent . . . Parents show us what is right from wrong . . .
In this quote, the young woman rejects poverty as a risk factor and instead ascribes risk as the consequence of familial neglect.
Others equivocated, stating that they did not know for sure what led to engagement in certain behaviors, but their responses still touched on the need for family as a positive example. A young female, age 15, speculates: . . . maybe it has to do with the family . . . we need our families to help guide us . . . but it is hard to say . . . I don’t know . . . why some kids do what they do . . . I just don’t know because I think it is complicated and has to be more than one thing . . .
Thus, it was clear that family involvement was important for these youth and many felt parents were key for setting the example and providing youth with a base at home.
A lack of socioeconomic opportunities
A lack of opportunities for socioeconomic advancement was also identified as a factor that fostered risk behaviors. In particular, 27 youth acknowledged the absence of legitimate job options and formal schooling prospects in Brazil as conditions that led to their engagement in risky behaviors. For example, a young woman (age 17) who had been involved with prostitution explained her situation: . . . I met [the pimp] and this is how it goes . . . with little other choice, other opportunities . . . for good work or better education . . . it’s easier than . . . [anything else] . . .
Similarly, a young man (15) who had been involved in gang activity expressed his opinion: . . . those in gangs . . ., [its] because there are so few opportunities for adolescents here, to do something productive, like go to college . . . gangs give young people an opportunity, you know to earn money, to take care of yourself . . .
These youth equated a lack of opportunities for work and education with a lack of productive, positive things for young people to do that keep them “out of trouble” and help them earn money.
In fact, the need to earn money appeared to be a prime motivator for many youth. For example, when another young man (16), who had been living and working in the streets, was asked about his situation, he stated: Because it is a way to earn money . . . we need opportunities for jobs to earn money . . . we have little prospects to . . . make a decent living . . . and selling drugs is a decent living . . . it is a sad truth, but that’s our reality . . . we lack alternatives . . . so . . . we’re in the street . . .
Others related their risk behaviors specifically to a lack of college prospects. For example, another young woman (14) when pressed about what factors had contributed to her truancy and fighting, stated: . . . If I had more chances to go to college, I think would stay in school . . . and not be on the streets getting into so much trouble, you know? But what’s the point? I don’t see that as my future . . . the opportunity just isn’t there . . .
These statements, therefore, relate risk behaviors to what youth perceive as a lack of viable socioeconomic opportunities for young people in their country and show how critical youth feel such opportunities are for moderating behaviors.
The social contract
Finally, and perhaps most interestingly, all but one young person in this study also linked problems with the family and a lack of socioeconomic opportunities to what they perceived as a failure on the part of the Brazilian government to fulfill the social contract. In this way, youth’s opinions regarding the factors that contribute to their risk behaviors extended into discussion of larger structural issues in Brazil. For example, when pressed on why she thought youth in Brazil lacked socioeconomic opportunities, a young woman (14) stated: . . . it is the government’s fault . . . so much corruption . . . so much disorganization . . . the government won’t invest in things that help us because they are too busy spending the money elsewhere . . .
Similarly, another young woman (age 14) in discussing the problems that families in Brazil face, stated: . . . we don’t have money coming back to us, for the things we need . . . help for our families . . . we have so much inequality in our society . . . and its because the government won’t invest in anything . . .
These frustrations were echoed by others and youth often relayed a feeling of exclusion in their discussions of the factors that contributed to their risk behaviors. When asked what could be done to help youth and their families, one young man (age 13) stated: . . . we have so many people who are excluded from society . . . and this makes it hard for us . . . we feel that the government doesn’t want to improve anything . . . Brazil is a country . . . for a few . . . and so we see everything in disarray, our families, our schools and its frustrating . . .
Thus, youth related the factors that put them at risk to what they perceived as structural problems that had arisen as a result of the Brazilian government’s failure to invest in social projects that would help young people and their families. In doing so, youth articulated a sense of frustration regarding their social positioning and, as the next section will demonstrate, it is that frustration that becomes crucial to how youth define risk.
Definition of Risk
When asked to define risk, all youth in this study described a process by which a young person, due to a lack of family and socioeconomic opportunities and frustration with Brazilian society at large, simply “gives up,” or loses their perspective of the future and ceases reaching for a better life. Some youth emphasized the role of the family and society in this process. For example, one male (13) in discussing why his friends use drugs, stated: . . . they have given up, they don’t care anymore, you understand? . . . feeling abandoned by their families . . . by society . . . they enter into the world of drugs . . . of violence and the street and . . . in the middle of shit!
Some emphasized the role of school or other positive opportunities, as another youth (female, age 16) stated: . . . those that drink and smoke and use drugs, that sit on the street all day doing nothing . . . they have no opportunities for anything . . . school doesn’t want them . . . they can’t work . . . [and] society makes it hard for us . . . so they have given up and [they] do whatever makes them feel better . . .
Most youth, however, looked at the process of disenfranchisement as one that was so multifaceted that it ultimately left youth with no choice but to “give up.” One final example comes from a young man (age 17) who had been involved in drug use and was having a difficult time at school due to constant altercations he was having with a group of classmates.
. . . it is hard . . . we lose perspective, I’m losing perspective . . . and that is the real risk isn’t it? When you give up? And you don’t care anymore . . . Adolescents, if they don’t have a good family, and nowhere to go, like a good school and they . . . believe that even the government doesn’t care . . . after that what is there left for you? So we just lose our way and we end up in the street or worse . . . I am afraid that will happen to me . . . but I don’t know what else to do . . .
Regardless of which factor youth attributed to their feelings of marginalization, the youth defined risk as what happens when young people become so frustrated with their social position within Brazilian society; they simply “give up” and begin engaging in risk behaviors. In this way, risk becomes a process of disenfranchisement that occurs as a result of youth’s social and structural barriers to inclusion.
Finding Resiliency
Finally, youth’s statements regarding risk behaviors provided insight into factors that promote resiliency among this population. In particular, when asked what kinds of support mechanisms youth felt they needed to stay engaged (i.e. not give up) and not participate in risk behaviors, 28 youth promoted the kinds of structure and skills that the social programs they were attending provided as a mechanism by which they gained a sense of purpose. One young man (age 13) emphasized a sense of productivity, he stated: . . . we need structure . . . If I didn’t have this opportunity, learning a job skill . . . if every adolescent had an opportunity like this, to learn how to do something productive . . . things would be a lot better in Brazil . . . if I didn’t have the opportunity . . . I’d be in the street . . . making a mess out of myself . . .
Some youth asserted confidence at having been able, through their training, to secure employment and aid their families financially. As one young woman (14) who was learning clerical work stated: Every adolescent needs something like this in their lives . . . I feel lucky because I am getting my first experience in the job market! But most importantly, I feel good, you know? Because I am helping my mother . . . Goodness, the help this has given my mother and me!
Even those youth who were attending other kinds of programs (sports initiatives, art programs, etc.) expressed a desire to learn a skill set. As one young man stated (17): I would have loved to have gone to (name of different organization) and learned a job skill, but instead I am here . . . there are so many adolescents who need that opportunity . . . because our education doesn’t really give us the skills we need to enter the job market . . . I think how great it would be to have that chance!
Finally, many youth related their experiences learning a new skill set back to the notion of “giving up” and argued that the opportunity they had been provided had given them “perspective” and set them on the “right path.” As the young woman cited earlier who had been engaged in prostitution stated: . . . before I entered into this program I had no occupation . . . no vision of the future . . . this gave me an experience, a new perspective, new direction . . . before I had a perspective of nothing, I was without direction . . . now I’m on a different path . . .
Discussion
In this qualitative study among at-risk youth in Brazil, we found that adolescents identified a lack of familial support and opportunities for legitimate socioeconomic advancement as factors that contributed to engagement in risk behaviors. Furthermore, youth related risk behaviors to larger structural problems in Brazil and a lack of commitment by their government to fulfill the social contract. They defined risk as a process of disenfranchisement in which young people faced with such social and structural barriers to inclusion ultimately “give up” and begin to engage in unhealthy behaviors.
Our study identified factors that promote resiliency in this population. When asked what support mechanisms youth needed to not “give up,” they clearly articulated a desire to for opportunities that provided the kind of structure they found while attending youth programs and to gain a marketable skill set. These opportunities were viewed as providing them not only with the means to help their families but also with a sense of purpose. In this way, youth’s perspectives on what factors they believe contribute to their risk behaviors, how they define risk, and what they believe promotes resiliency provides insight for a broad, more general understanding of youth risk and resiliency and one that accounts for contextual differences.
The present work supports much of the existing work on risk and resiliency, from both Brazil and elsewhere. Studies from the United States, Latin America, Asia, and the Middle East have shown that youth who have a strong sense of familial connectedness are less likely to engage in risk behaviors (Chamratrithirong et al., 2010; Guilamo-Ramos, Bouris, Jaccard, Lesesne, & Ballan, 2009; Li et al., 2002; Parsai et al., 2009; Roche, Ahmed, & Blum, 2008; Springer et al., 2006). In Brazil, where family ties have held a privileged place in the construction of societal relations (Da Matta, 1991), youth’s assertions about the need for family upbringing are particularly telling. Such statements force us to look critically at whether youth’s criticisms of the family are warranted. Despite social investments (e.g., Bolsa Família, see Fenwick, 2009), Brazilian families continue to face high rates of violence and resource scarcity for children (Ellsberg, Jansen, Heise, Watts, & Carcia-Moreno, 2008; Instituto de Pesquisa Econômica Aplicada, 2008; Waiselfisz, 2011). Furthermore, the majority of households in Brazil are single parent (mostly female; Pinheiro, 2008), a factor linked to certain drug use and sexual risk taking in the country (Peres et al., 2008). Therefore, while Brazil has increased its investment into bettering the lives of young people and their families, there still are significant areas that need improvement and youth’s statements regarding the need for familial support must be viewed in this context.
This work also shows how opportunities for work, schooling, and other positive experiences may promote resiliency against risk taking. Elsewhere studies have shown that youth who are positively engaged in activities that promote their competency and increase confidence are less likely to exhibit risk behaviors (Akers, Muhammad, & Corbie-Smith, 2010; Cinamon & Hason, 2008; Eggerman & Panter-Brick, 2010; McNeely & Falci, 2004; White & Green, 2011; Youngblade et al., 2007). However, that youth purport a lack of opportunities for socioeconomic advancement in Brazil is not surprising. Despite improvements (Ministério da Educação, 2008), Brazil has long been criticized for the systemic inequality inherent in its educational system; many youth, who cannot afford private education have little to no college prospects, abandon school early and are left with very few quality job options (Brazil Institute, 2007). At the structural level, youth’s perceptions of risk highlight some of the socioeconomic barriers to social inclusion and call attention to the issue of systemic inequality that has characterized the Brazilian social landscape. Although these problems are not unique to Brazil, youth’s perspectives of risk nonetheless raise questions about how these issues combine to affect the lives of youth in Brazil, what external barriers they face in their everyday lives, and the impact that youth’s risk behaviors and their continued social exclusion might have for Brazilian society at large.
The present study also supports literature that examines connections between youth disenfranchisement and risk behaviors and the larger sociocultural problems these issues highlight (Dalsgaard et al., 2008; Giroux, 2009; MacLeod, 1995). Giroux (2009) writing on disenfranchised youth argues that economic uncertainty and the collapse of state support mechanisms have rendered youth in the United States an unworthy form of social investment and no longer the referent of a democratic future. Such a stance has dire implications for the health (both political and biological) of any nation and therefore, it is within this context that youth’s statements concerning their need for certain forms of social support and the roles these mechanisms play in their capacity to not “give up” cannot be ignored. The sense of disengagement from society reported by these youth provides a powerful message about the importance of keeping the social contract intact. If youth, due to the frustrations they encounter, view the social contract as a fallacy and therefore, “give up” because they no longer see the value of operating within the confines of socially “acceptable” behaviors, and begin to seek alternative measures of inclusion elsewhere, what consequences does this have for society as a whole? What repercussions might such fatalism have for Brazil, or similar countries, where the larger projects of promoting social inclusion, equality and political stability have characteristically been difficult? “Giving up” then, as one informant stated, may be the real risk and perhaps it is far more damaging to these youth than the social conditions they experience or the behaviors they engage in.
Finally, while ECA as a policy has not traditionally been well received (de Almeida Dias et al., 2008) in Brazil, youth nonetheless viewed ECA endorsed programs as a means of gaining viable skills sets that promote resiliency. This study is therefore in keeping with those that promote alternative models of resiliency and recognize that while certain social conditions (e.g., lack of access to resources or opportunities, unstructured families) may be universal, the path to resiliency is not; resiliency should be viewed as a contextually dependent process in which individuals successfully negotiate adversity within a particular place, time, and culture (Ungar et al., 2007). Thus, this work points to the importance of cross-cultural studies for finding ways to include youth’s perspectives on the conditions that lead to risk behaviors and what factors promote resiliency into the development of programs and policies (in Brazil and arguably elsewhere) to meet the specific needs of different youth populations. It also suggests that longitudinal research is needed that evaluates the effectiveness of programs in Brazil and their usefulness as a model for promoting resiliency elsewhere. Finally, this work also points to the need for more programs in Brazil that support families in nurturing their youth.
Limitations
There are several limitations to this work that need to be addressed and that suggest areas of further research. This work deals specifically with youth, ages 12 to 17, who attend organizations for at-risk youth in Juiz de Fora, Brazil. It therefore is limited in its generalizability. This work does not address how youth who are not engaged in at-risk programs, or from other cities in Brazil, view risk and more research in wider settings are needed to understand more definitively how these concepts are culturally constructed in Brazil. Likewise, it was not within the scope of this research to assess the efficacy of ECA’s policies or of the work done by the organizations used in this study. Research is needed that seeks to understand what impact, if at all, the kinds of youth organizations promoted by ECA have had on the lives of young people and how these programs might influence youth’s perspectives on their social condition.
This work also presents some analytic challenges that need to be addressed. First, only one coder analyzed the transcripts. However, data triangulation from multiple sources including field study helps to ensure the validity and credibility of study findings. Second, this work was centered on risk behaviors that commonly led youth into social programs; thus, the behaviors addressed typically have some legal or social work implications. The interpretations of risk it presents cannot, therefore, be extended into other behaviors (e.g., food disorders, wearing a seat belt, or helmet) that also have an impact on youth’s health, but that are not typically encountered in the sociolegal structure in Brazil. Risk was also addressed by using a broad, social-interpretive context. As such, this work is limited in its ability to define and understand more subtle variances in the meanings placed on different risk behaviors (e.g. sexual risk taking as opposed to gang involvement).
Last, the position of the first author as a foreign researcher needs to be taken into consideration. The first author minimized the impact that her “outsider” status might have over the youth’s responses by spending several months working at the organizations prior to beginning interviews. This allowed youth in the study to become familiar with her and to begin to develop a sense of trust as she increased her entrée into the community. That said, the first author was careful not to force interactions with youth and respected any youth’s wish to not discuss topics that made them uncomfortable or embarrassed.
Conclusions
The present work shows how youth understood engagement in risk behaviors in two key ways: First, at the societal level, youth identified family and socioeconomic opportunities as mediators for risk taking. They expressed disillusionment over what they perceived as a lack of investment in them on the part of the Brazilian state in terms of providing them with the support mechanisms they deemed necessary. Second, they described risk as a process of “giving up” or becoming disenfranchised that results from having a dysfunctional family and limited socioeconomic opportunities. Youth link their perspectives on risk to the social contract and highlight the impact that social exclusion of children and adolescents might have on Brazilian society at large.
Footnotes
Declaration of Conflicting Interests
The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.
Funding
The author(s) disclosed receipt of the following financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article: National Science Foundation Doctoral Dissertation Improvement Grant.