Page 188 - Ana Kozina and Nora Wiium, eds. ▪︎ Positive Youth Development in Contexts. Ljubljana: Educational Research Institute, 2021. Digital Library, Dissertationes (Scientific Monographs), 42.
P. 188
positive youth development in contexts
We assessed research design according to 10 criteria: randomisation
for assignment of the participants to treatment groups, concealed alloca-
tion of the participants to conditions, similarity of groups at the baseline,
blindness of the participants to group assignment, blindness of the outcome
assessors to group assignment, identical treatment of the groups other than
intervention, completeness of the follow-up, identical outcome measure-
ment for groups, sufficient reliability of the measures (α > 0.75) (Bucik, 1997)
and the use of appropriate statistical analysis procedures. A point was given
for each criterion met, meaning a particular article could achieve a total of
10 points. The assessment of article quality is presented in Table 2.
Results and discussion
In this section, the combined results of the studies included in the system-
atic review are presented. The section is divided into multiple subchapters
according to the research questions set out written in the introductory part
of this paper. First, we provide results concerning the general effectiveness
of contact-based interventions and compare the effectiveness of direct and
indirect contact interventions. Our focus then shifts to the characteristics
of interventions that were shown to be important contributors to their ef-
fectiveness. We compare the effectiveness of interventions depending on
characteristics of the target group, namely the participants‘ ethnic status
and age. Below, we focus on relevant characteristics of the intervention it-
self and compare effectiveness as regards the intervention administrator,
the duration, and the number of sessions. Finally, we compare the interven-
tions’ participants with respect to different types of outcomes.
Effectiveness of contact-based interventions
According to the results, contact-based interventions had on average a
small-to-moderate positive effect on prejudice and related outcomes (see
Table 1), which is in line with the average effect sizes in a meta-analytic re-
view by Ülger et al., 2018 (k1 = 19, d+= 0.46, 95% CI [0.23, 0.68]). All stud-
ies reported having at least one significant effect between or within groups
over time, while 8 of 10 reported significant effects on most outcomes.
Two studies with mostly non-significant results (n = 8, d+= 0.05, 95% CI
[0.01, 0.09]) were of lower research quality (see Table 2, namely Liebkind
et al., 2013; Vezzali et al., 2018), again proving methodological quality to be
1 Number of studies included in the meta-analysis by Ülger et al. (2018)
188
We assessed research design according to 10 criteria: randomisation
for assignment of the participants to treatment groups, concealed alloca-
tion of the participants to conditions, similarity of groups at the baseline,
blindness of the participants to group assignment, blindness of the outcome
assessors to group assignment, identical treatment of the groups other than
intervention, completeness of the follow-up, identical outcome measure-
ment for groups, sufficient reliability of the measures (α > 0.75) (Bucik, 1997)
and the use of appropriate statistical analysis procedures. A point was given
for each criterion met, meaning a particular article could achieve a total of
10 points. The assessment of article quality is presented in Table 2.
Results and discussion
In this section, the combined results of the studies included in the system-
atic review are presented. The section is divided into multiple subchapters
according to the research questions set out written in the introductory part
of this paper. First, we provide results concerning the general effectiveness
of contact-based interventions and compare the effectiveness of direct and
indirect contact interventions. Our focus then shifts to the characteristics
of interventions that were shown to be important contributors to their ef-
fectiveness. We compare the effectiveness of interventions depending on
characteristics of the target group, namely the participants‘ ethnic status
and age. Below, we focus on relevant characteristics of the intervention it-
self and compare effectiveness as regards the intervention administrator,
the duration, and the number of sessions. Finally, we compare the interven-
tions’ participants with respect to different types of outcomes.
Effectiveness of contact-based interventions
According to the results, contact-based interventions had on average a
small-to-moderate positive effect on prejudice and related outcomes (see
Table 1), which is in line with the average effect sizes in a meta-analytic re-
view by Ülger et al., 2018 (k1 = 19, d+= 0.46, 95% CI [0.23, 0.68]). All stud-
ies reported having at least one significant effect between or within groups
over time, while 8 of 10 reported significant effects on most outcomes.
Two studies with mostly non-significant results (n = 8, d+= 0.05, 95% CI
[0.01, 0.09]) were of lower research quality (see Table 2, namely Liebkind
et al., 2013; Vezzali et al., 2018), again proving methodological quality to be
1 Number of studies included in the meta-analysis by Ülger et al. (2018)
188
