Age differences in adolescent future-oriented goals,concerns, and related temporal extension in different sociocultural contexts

The aim of this study was to investigate the extent to which differences in agegraded sociocultural contexts influence adolescent future-oriented goals, concerns, and related temporal extension. Ninety-five 13–14-year-old Australian boys and 104 girls, 87 16–17-year-old Australian boys and 81 girls, 67 13–14-year-old Finnish boys and 86 girls, and 56 16–17-year-old Finnish boys and 107 girls were investigated. Half of the subjects in each group came from an urban environment and half from rural regions. The subjects filled in the Hopes and Fears Questionnaire measuring the content and temporal extension of goals and concerns. Overall, the results showed that adolescent goals, concerns, and related temporal extension reflected the major developmental tasks of their own age and early adulthood. However, interesting cross-cultural, gender, and urban rural differences were also found, reflecting variation in societal options and cultural values. For example, Australians were more interested in leisure and more concerned about their own health and global issues. Later school transitions meant that in older age groups the Finnish adolescents expected goals related to their future education and occupation to be actualized later than Australian youths did. Because of a lack of career options, interest in a future occupation decreased with age among adolescents living in rural regions.Received Ph.D. from University of Helsinki. Research interests are adolescent development and cognitive and attributional strategies as pathways to problem behavior. To whom correspondence should be addressed.Received Ph.D. from La Trobe University. Research interests are higher education policy, research management, women and careers, and adolescence.Received M.A. from University of Helsinki. Research interests are identity development and problem solving.     

Adolescents' self-perceptions of competence in life skill areas

The perceptions of a sample of 1061 adolescents of their own competence in a number of life-skill areas were assessed. Three sets of scales were used—those concerned with competence viewed as efficacy in various life areas and situations, those concerned with competence as the satisfaction of goals based on Maslow's hierarchy of needs, and assessments of the structural complexity of performance on a short essay task. In addition to comparisons among self-perceptions for different areas, a number of major comtextual and personal variables was studied for differences in self-perceptions—course type, school type, state, career aspirations and expectations, major life concerns, age, and gender. There were strong gender differences that suggested that females generally underrated their own competence. The major educational or work contexts reflected important differences in patterns of self perceptions of skill. Differences between those with different major life concerns and career hopes and expectations aligned with course type differences. Finally, there were strong indications that the self-perceptions of competence that were reported formed a strong general factor, favoring the notion of generic over domain specific self-perceptions.Reveived Ph.D. in Socio- and psycholinguistics from La Trobe Unitersity. Research interests include youth and adolescence and social policy.Received Ph.D. in educational psychology from University of Queensland. Research interests include adolescent life skills and learning and cognition.     

Dogmatic Liberalism? T.R.S. Allan and the Common Law Constitution

Book reviewed in this article:
T.R.S. Allan, Constitutional Justice: A Liberal Theory of the Rule of Law     

The Evolution of China’s Security Challenges and Grand Strategy

This article examines changes in China’s security perceptions since 1949 and sketches the evolution of China’s grand strategy. In tracing the evolution of China’s security perceptions and grand strategy since 1949, it identifies elements of change as well as continuity. The changes reflect dramatic developments in the PRC’s capabilities and the international circumstances it faces, both of which have shaped the grand strategic choices of China’s leaders. During most of the Cold War decades, a relatively weak China’s vulnerability to serious military threats from much more powerful adversaries led the CCP to adopt grand strategies focused on coping with a clearly defined external security challenge. After the Cold War and especially in the 21st century, an increasingly complex array of internal and external security concerns confronts China’s leaders with new challenges. The paper concludes with a discussion of the significance of the recently established National Security Commission and offers brief observations about its potential significance for the CCP’s leadership in their fight against the new domestic and international security challenges it faces. The novelty of China’s security challenges at home and abroad in the 21st century is a consequence of the end of the Cold War international order and perhaps more importantly, a consequence of China’s successful modernization since 1979.