From The Perspective Of Positive Youth Development,the Influence Of Adverse Childhood Experiences On Flourishing In Adolescents And The Moderating Role Of Self-Compassion

The adolescent stage plays an important role in the development of a person’s life.How we view and recognize the development of the adolescent determines how we educate and train the adolescent to a certain extent.Social work plays an assisting and promoting role in the development of adolescent.But for a long time in the past,it has been common to adopt the pathologic view that adolescents are "problematic" or "imperfect" due to the physical and mental changes in adolescence that lead to conflicts in personal cognition,interpersonal relationships,etc.Research focuses on the factors associated with these "defects" of adolescents,and aims to mold adolescents without problems.The positive youth development concept emphasizes that the growth of adolescents is not only to prevent the emergence of problems,but also to pay attention to the advantages and potential of adolescents,and regard them as "resources" to be developed.It can form good quality,achieve growth positively,shape productive members of the society and make more contributions to the society under positive guidance and cultivation.Adverse childhood experience refers to three negative experiences that an individual has suffered before the age of 18,including child abuse,neglect and family dysfunction.It is estimated that more than half of the world’s population has experienced at least one adverse childhood experience,and about one in seven has reported exposure to four or more adverse childhood experiences.Adverse childhood experiences not only impose economic burdens on the country,but also negatively affect the flourishing and positive development of individuals.In the past,people generally adopted the view of pathology,believing that adverse childhood experiences would have a negative impact on individuals’ physiology,psychology,behavior and personal growth.However,the concept of positive youth development puts forward a possibility that even teenagers with adverse childhood experiences have the ability and potential to actively adapt to maintain health and positive development,and can form excellent quality,achieve positive growth and make more contributions to society under active guidance and cultivation.Based on the developmental psychoapthology and resilience perspective and self-compassion theory,this study explores the influence of adverse childhood experiences on adolescent flourishing,and the moderating effect of self-compassion on the influence of adverse childhood experiences on adolescent flourishing.Questionnaire survey was adopted in this study.The research sample included 324 middle school students.The data were analyzed by linear regression analysis,moderating effect analysis and other statistical methods.The results showed that the detection rate of adverse childhood experiences of middle school students was higher,among which the detection rate and score of abuse was the highest,followed by neglect and family dysfunction.There is no gender difference in adverse childhood experience and three dimensions of middle school students,but adverse childhood experience and family dysfunction dimension have significant differences in parents’ marital status,neglect status has significant differences in father’s education level;Middle school students showed a good level of flourishing level on the whole,among which social well-being scored the highest,followed by psychological well-being and emotional well-being.There are significant gender differences in the dimensions of psychological well-being of middle school students,the overall level of flourishing and social well-being are marginal significant,but there is no difference in parents’ marital status,parents’ education level;The adverse childhood experience of middle school students has a significant negative predictive effect on the flourishing level,which shows that the more adverse childhood experience of middle school students,the lower the flourishing level;The self-compassion level of middle school students has a significant positive prediction effect on their flourishing,which shows that the higher the self-compassion level of middle school students,the higher the flourishing level.More importantly,this study found that self-compassion had a moderating effect on the relationship between adverse childhood experiences and flourishing of middle school students.In the group with low self-compassion level,adverse childhood experiences had a stronger negative effect on flourishing level.In the group with high self-compassion level,the negative effect of adverse childhood experiences on flourishing level was weakened,indicating that high selfcompassion level could weaken the negative predictive effect of adverse childhood experiences on flourishing level,and the protective effect of self-compassion cushioned the effect of adverse childhood experiences on flourishing level.Therefore,in the current situation of the occurrence of adverse childhood experience is relatively common,the results of this study can arouse the attention of the society to the group with adverse childhood experience and flourishing growth,under the guidance of the positive youth development concept,combined with the social work practice.Social work should be carried out from the prevention perspective(multi-level intervention to reduce the occurrence of adverse childhood experiences),the solution perspective(family-school-community cooperation to enhance the level of compassion of adolescent)and the development perspective(practicing positive youth development to promote the flourishing development of young people),so as to promote the positive growth of youth and become more productive members of society.