Forum focuses on youth development strategies

In stark contrast to adolescent daily life prior to the digital age, social media allows todayâ??s youth to see and interact with myriad individuals, images and information at any time, from any place. This new reality has profound impacts on our interactions. Less clear is what those effects are and how they may shape the later life and social relationships of the youth growing up in it. Such was the focus of the Seventh Annual Youth Development Research Update, a forum that brought more than 50 Cornell Cooperative Extension educators and 4-H program leaders, youth service providers from community agencies and Cornell faculty members from across campus to discuss issues relevant to the well-being and development of children and adolescents on May 31 and June 1. The event, sponsored by the Program for Research on Youth Development and Engagement (PRYDE), based in the College of Human Ecology, concentrated on productive social media use and youth development through research and evidence-based approaches. â?'The idea behind productive social media is that there are ways to encourage youth to develop positive and productive uses of social media,â'' said Elaine Wethington, professor of human development and co-director of PRYDE. She also leads the research project Productive Use of Social Media by Youth, which focuses on learning how teens can be â?'nudgedâ'' to make positive uses of social media as they transition into adulthood.