Young citizens in school: A meta-analytic examination of the relationship between experiences at school and youth’s political competencies, attitudes, and behaviors

拟议的项目考察了学校经历与青年政治能力、态度和行为（积极公民）之间的关系。青年时期是人生政治发展的形成时期。由于年轻人在教育环境中花费大量时间，学校也有鼓励学生积极成为公民的共同目标，他们被认为是社会化的一个有影响力的背景。学校经历与青年积极公民意识之间的关系已被实证证实。然而，学校环境提供了各种各样的经验，从课程（如公民课程的内容和数量）到结构和气候特征（如学校参与的机会、课堂气氛、关系气氛）。由于指标的多样性，因此很难得出关于总体上“有利的”课程或结构/气候学校特征（例如整体民主的学校气候）或仅独特的学校特征（例如具体的学校参与机会）与各种各样的政治结果或仅与某些政治能力，态度和行为相关的程度的概括结论。此外，很少有系统的证据表明，学校经历的影响会随着时间的推移而持续多久，或者是否有些学生从某些学校经历中比其他人受益更多。因此，拟议的项目旨在进行荟萃分析，系统地整合关于学校经历和青年积极公民关系的定量研究结果。具体而言，将解决两个目标：首先，将在概念层面（即考虑学校经历和积极公民的不同指标）、情境层面（即比较个人和课堂层面的影响）和测量时间层面（即比较横断面和纵向关联）测试学校影响对青年积极公民的重要性和普遍性。其次，学校经历和积极公民之间的关系将被年龄、性别以及社会经济、文化和家庭背景（如家庭政治化程度）所调节。对实证研究结果的元分析整合将有助于更深刻地理解学校在青年政治发展中的作用。对个体间差异的考虑将进一步提供一幅更有差异的图景，即学校经历在多大程度上可以弥补或加速最初的差异（例如，由于社会人口因素）。这种理解，反过来又是学校提高学生政治意识的基本前提，无论其性别、文化背景或教育水平如何。

The proposed project examines the relation between experiences at school and political competencies, attitudes, and behaviors (active citizenship) in youth. Youth is a formative period in life for political development. With young people spending much time in educational settings and schools sharing the common goal to encourage students to active citizenship, they are considered as an influential context of socialization.The relationship between experiences at school and youth’s active citizenship has been empirically confirmed. However, the school context offers a wide variety of experiences ranging from curricular (e.g. content and quantity of civic classes) to structural and climatic characteristics (e.g. opportunities for school participation, classroom climate, relationship climate). Due to the diversity of indicators it is therefore difficult to draw generalized conclusions about the extent to which generally "favorable" curricular or structural/climatic school characteristics (e.g. an overall democratic school climate) or only distinctive school characteristics (e.g. concrete opportunities for school participation) are either associated with a wide variety of political outcomes or only with certain political competencies, attitudes, and behaviors in particular. In addition, there is little systematic evidence about how persistent the effects of school experiences are over time or whether some students benefit more from certain school experiences than others.The proposed project therefore aims at a meta-analysis systematically integrating quantitative findings on the nexus of school experiences and youth active citizenship. In particular, two objectives will be addressed: First, the significance and generalizability of school effects on youth’s active citizenship will be tested at the conceptual level (i.e. considering different indicators of school experiences and active citizenship), contextual level (i.e. comparing individual and classroom level effects), and at the level of measurement time (i.e. comparing cross-sectional and longitudinal associations). Second, the relation between school experiences and active citizenship will be tested for moderations by age, gender, as well as socioeconomic, cultural, and family background (e.g. degree of familial politicization).The meta-analytic integration of empirical research findings will contribute to a more profound understanding of school’s role in youth’s political development. The consideration of inter-individual differences will furthermore provide a more differentiated picture to what extent school experiences can compensate for or accelerate initial differences (e.g. due to socio-demographic factors). This understanding, in turn, is a fundamental prerequisite for schools to raise their students’ political awareness regardless of their gender, cultural background, or educational level.