Doctoral Dissertation Improvement Grant: Adolescent Rehabilitation in an American Residential Treatment Center

Rebecca J. Lester博士的监督下，研究生凯瑟琳Hejtmanek将进行美国文化价值观和康复过程之间的关系的研究，在一个住宅治疗设施，主要治疗低收入和少数民族青年。寄宿治疗在美国社会有着悠久的历史，用于为被认为不适合社会生活的青年提供住房和治疗。今天，这是为20万边缘化青年提供的最后和最严厉的社会服务，然后他们才能迎接成年的挑战。这个研究项目调查被认为任性的青少年如何被改造成被认为是体面的成年人。研究人员将对一个特定的设施及其项目进行案例研究。她将研究该计划与更广泛的文化价值观和关于美国主流良好人格观念的社会辩论之间的关系。指导性研究问题包括：工作人员如何在日常生活中实施该中心的道德责任的官方模式，因为他们去的活动和互动，包括康复？工作人员和住院医师如何确定住院医师是否以及何时学习和内化了这种模式？为了回答这些问题，研究人员将在家里生活和工作。她将使用五种实地研究方法：参与观察，与工作人员和居民的焦点小组访谈，与工作人员的半结构化访谈，与居民的生活史访谈，以及档案和文献研究。该项目将以两种方式为社会科学做出贡献。首先，它将通过利用青少年自己的社会康复经验作为重要的数据来源，在方法上作出贡献。其次，本项目将记录宏观层面的文化价值观，微观层面的治疗技术和个人层面的经验如何相互交流以构建社会生活的过程。本研究的结果将有助于理解其他社会康复计划的社会嵌入在不同的文化背景下，被排斥的青年。最后，本计画有助于人类学研究生的培养。

Under the supervision of Dr. Rebecca J. Lester, graduate student Katherine Hejtmanek will undertake a study of the relationship between American cultural values and the process of rehabilitation at a residential treatment facility that treats primarily low-income and minority youth. Residential treatment has a long history in American society for housing and treating youth considered to be socially inadequate. Today, it is the final and most drastic social service provision for two hundred thousand marginalized youth before they meet the challenges of adulthood. This research project investigates how adolescents deemed wayward are rehabilitated to become adults who are considered decent. The researcher will undertake a case study of a specific facility and its programs. She will examine the relationship between the program and broader cultural values and social debates about mainstream American notions of good personhood. Guiding research questions include: How do staff members implement the center's official model of moral responsibility in daily life as they go about the activities and interactions that comprise rehabilitation? and how do staff and residents determine if and when the residents have learned and internalized this model? To answer these questions, the researcher will live and work at the home. She will use five field research methods: participant observation, focus group interviews with staff members and residents, semi-structured interviews with staff members, life history interviews with residents, and archival and literature research. This project will contribute to social science in two ways. First, it will make a methodological contribution by utilizing utilizes adolescents' own experiences of their social rehabilitation as a critical source of data. Second, this project will document the process by which how macro-level cultural values, micro-level therapeutic techniques, and individual-level experiences inform each other to construct social life. The results of this study will contribute to understanding the social embeddedness of other social rehabilitation programs for excluded youth in various cultural contexts. Finally, this project contributes to the anthropological training of the graduate student.