That Difficult Age: Developing a More Effective Response to Risks in Adolescence

• Report authors Dr Elly Hanson and Dez Holmes, Research in Practice, November 2014

Key Messages

Responses to adolescent risk are ineffective and do not fit with the lived experience of young people.

This is due, in part, to safeguarding processes being primarily designed to respond to intra-familial risks facing younger children. But the report also says there is insufficient understanding of risks and their contributors, and understanding of ways to promote the strengths and opportunities of adolescence.

The report states that in their journey to adulthood, adolescents often make choices or engage in behaviours which are influenced by specific developmental processes underpinned by social and developmental influences - for example, risk-taking, emotional highs and lows, and sensitivity to peer influence. These factors can be exploited by others.

The report says because adolescents are sensitive to social threat, social status and changes to the way they see themselves as they grow older, they may be at risk from gangs if they live in a neighbourhood where gangs operate, and they do not have other ways to feel safe, develop their sense of self and connect with their friends.

The authors state the ways young people adapt to childhood harm or trauma might increase the risk of harm in adolescence, through leaving children with unmet needs that can be exploited by others, and that this may be especially likely if less harmful options remain unavailable, for example:

• A child may respond to a violent home environment by becoming hypervigilant to signs of danger - which may increase risk from gangs, due to the perceived protective benefits of gangs.
• A child may become a gang member in an attempt to feel wanted or noticed.

Understanding adolescent development in child protection responses to risks and harms children face is essential to keeping them safe. Yet, traditional child protection processes can present challenges to this way of working. A key challenge is conceptualisation of adolescent choices as "lifestyle choices", which can lead to victims of harm being denied appropriate support. Conversely, another challenge is that professionals can minimise their capacity to act independently and to make their own free choices, thereby missing the opportunity to work in partnership with young people.

Current child protection systems can make it difficult for workers to protect young people. Barriers include:

• Service-led pathways
• High thresholds for support
• Short-term interventions
• Prioritisation of "managing risk" over "building on strengths"
• "Labelling" of young people according to their difficulties and risks
• Separate services dealing with different aspects of the issue, leading to structural divides which ignore the inter-connected nature of risks
• Lack of emotional support for some workers.
• Effective engagement is more likely when practitioners:
• Focus on, and work with, an adolescent's strengths
• Are supported to understand factors potentially influencing risks
• "Go with the grain" of adolescent development, and harness it as a strength
• Focus on young people's needs, goals, values and aspirations.

Limitations

This research focuses on children, their resilience and their agency. This is crucial, but may not fully appreciate the levels of threats and violence that children may be subject to in relation to gang or criminal exploitation, which is likely to impact on their ability to further apply these skills, particularly if they are operating in multiple unsafe environments.

Implications for practice

The paper concludes a more effective response to supporting adolescents requires a fundamental shift across society as a whole in how we view young people.

We need to appreciate their capacity to act independently and to make their own free choices; acknowledge them as citizens and assets to society; and recognise and tackle the societal issues that can impact on, and discriminate against, them.

A case is presented for re-designing systems to:

• "Work with the grain" of adolescent development
• Take a more nuanced approach to identifying risk
• Place relationships at the heart
• Focus on identifying strengths and building resilience.

SEVEN PRINCIPLES FOR REDESIGNING SYSTEMS

The paper presents seven principles to achieve redesigning systems. This is applicable to both whole-systems restructuring, and daily practice.

1. Work with adolescent development - in particular perception, agency, aspiration and skill - e.g. identity formation, friendship attachments, risk-taking. This includes focusing on responses that "work with" rather than "do to" young people.
2. Work with young people as assets and resources (drawing on their strengths).
3. Promote supportive relationships between young people and their family and peers.
4. Prioritise supportive adolescent-practitioner relationships within system responses.
5. Take a holistic approach to young people and the risks they face.
6. Ensure services are accessible and advertised - e.g. incorporate self-referral, social marketing and outreach.
7. Equip and support the workforce, including through high-quality learning opportunities and regular supportive supervision.
   
   

Barnardo's, the UK's leading children's charity, has more than a thousand services. It is seeing increasing numbers of cases of children at risk of multiple dangers, including sexual and criminal exploitation

Read more in CYP Now's Gangs and Criminal Exploitation Special Report