Abstract
This chapter focuses on experiences of a group of young people in New Zealand who faced high levels of adversity. It considers three key cultural groups in the New Zealand context (Māori, Pacific Island and Pākehā) and the relationship of these to four key dimensions of youth lives; risk, resilience, social and educational outcomes and opportunities. We explore the nuanced and subtle ways that different cultural identification manifested itself in these key areas of youth lives. The findings suggest a complicated set of interactions between culture, risks, resilience and outcomes among vulnerable youth that may not be apparent when considering patterns of overall advantage and disadvantage that apply at national population levels. Service providers need to respond to this complex relationship between risk, resilience and culture by developing interventions with individual youth that directly respond to the specific aspects of their social ecologies in order to create opportunities for improved outcomes. This means we need to think differently about each of the cultural groups we work with rather than responding in uniform ways; for Māori and Pacific youth there are cultural resources to draw on that can be used to address risk, but for Pākehā youth attention may need to be given to creating resources and relationships that will provide them with a stronger positive sense of identity and cohesion.
The authors thank the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment for funding this research. The contribution of the Donald Beasley Institute, The Victoria University Research Trust and its staff, Youthline Auckland and Kapiti Youth support is acknowledged. Most importantly the authors gratefully thank all the youth and their supporters who participated in this research.
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Notes
- 1.
Māori are the indigenous people of New Zealand.
- 2.
The remaining 17 youth reported the following ethnicities: African, 5; Asian, 7; Middle Eastern, 4; didn’t know, 1.
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Sanders, J., Munford, R. (2015). The Interaction Between Culture, Resilience, Risks and Outcomes: A New Zealand Study. In: Theron, L., Liebenberg, L., Ungar, M. (eds) Youth Resilience and Culture. Cross-Cultural Advancements in Positive Psychology, vol 11. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-017-9415-2_6
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