Social skills efficacy and proactivity among Native American Adolescents.

This article discusses Native American urban adolescents' construal of social skills, and relationships between these skills and proactivity behaviors as identified in the Integrative Contextual Model of Career Development (Lapan, 2004). Recommendations that build upon the social skills strengths of Native American young people are included.

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Theorists have identified the importance of social skills in the academic and career success of young people. Social skills can be defined as part of the common factors that allow young people to successfully negotiate their academic, career, and personal lives. The construct of social skills also underlies the assumptions of many academic and career development theories. Thus, social skills are related to the career development of adolescents in both pantheoretical and theoretical ways.

For example, in the Theory of Work Adjustment (Dawis & Loftquist, 1984), social skills can be conceptualized as one of the categories of basic skills that are learned and stabilized throughout childhood. Social skills, in this theory, are instrumental tools for increasing employees' satisfaction and satisfactoriness to their employers through their abilities to negotiate correspondence between self and the environment. Social skills can be theoretically related to the ability to persevere in the face of adverse circumstances, thus increasing workers' tolerance for workplace stress, which in turn increases length of job tenure.

In the Theory of Vocational Personalities and Work Environments (Holland, 1997), social skills can be conceptualized as tools to help job seekers find congruence between their expressed interests and opportunities in the world of work. In this theory, person-environment fit can be increased as persons who are considering employment opportunities use social skills to network and explore careers through various person-centered exploration activities.

In the Theory of Career Construction (Savickas, 2002), social skills can be used to extend oneself into the social organization of occupations. Social skills help young people connect to their communities and construct careers according to community norms, psychosocial development, and cultural adaptation. Social skills can increase one's readiness and resources for coping with vocational development tasks, occupational transitions, and personal traumas, thus strengthening the career adaptability that is increasingly required in our post-industrial society.

The Integrative Contextual Model of Career Development (ICM; Lapan, 2004) directly addresses the contribution of social skills to the career development of young people. According to ICM, the development of social skills allows young people to learn to work with others who may be demographically and multiculturally quite different from themselves (Bloch, 1996). Moreover, social skills are related to such proactivity attitudes and behaviors as awareness of opportunity, assertiveness, initiative, flexibility, and adaptability, which are critical components for success in today's labor market.

Researchers have shown that social skills are connected to young people's academic achievement, ability to set career goals, vocational identity, career self-efficacy and attributions, vocational interests, and career exploration (Lapan, 2004; Turner et al., in press). Among adults, workers who have good interpersonal skills are able to establish and maintain positive relationships with both co-workers and supervisors, perform more competently in their jobs, become more socially integrated into the organization, experience greater job satisfaction and workplace rewards, and demonstrate greater workplace stamina and adjustment by promoting such worker characteristics as stability, resilience, self-esteem, and self-efficacy (Ashford & Black, 1996; Fisher, 1985; Ladd & Kochenderfer, 1996; Lapan; Wanberg & Kammeyer-Mueller, 2000).

Further, researchers have shown positive career behaviors for people with proactivity skills. For example, a person's perception or awareness of the opportunity structure is related to career aspirations (Evans & Herr, 1991); assertiveness is related to career and life satisfaction (Lounsbury, Park, Sundstrom, Williamson, & Pemberton, 2004); initiative is strongly related to employability orientation, which in turn is related to employment-seeking activities (van Dam, 2004); flexibility is related to the development of professional expertness and career growth (van der Heijden, 2002); and adaptability is related to career optimism and positive career planning attitudes (Rottinghaus, Day, & Borgen, 2005).

Little has been written about the social skills development of Native American adolescents. However, the socio-cultural competencies of Native American people are apparent as generations of Native Americans continue to develop societies that are collaborative, communal, and dedicated to prosocial ideals. Nevertheless, far too little work has been done to examine the social skills development and relationship pattern differences between the sexes and among children from different cultures (Ladd, 1999). Understanding these dynamics can be especially important for educators and professional school counselors who work with Native American youth, as they seek to increase these young people's academic preparation, initial job placement, and opportunities to engage in meaningful, rewarding work (Fullerton, 1999; Reyhner, 2004).

PURPOSE OF THE STUDY

The purpose of this study, therefore, was to examine how Native American young people identify and understand social skills, to investigate differences in their level of efficaciousness for the various types of social skills they identify, and to explore how the various social skills identified are associated with proactive attitudes and behaviors as identified in ICM theory (Lapan, 2004). We hypothesized that exploratory factor analysis would reveal a clear pattern of logically connected types of social skills among Native American adolescents (Hypothesis 1), that there would be significant within-group differences in the strength of social skills self-efficacy among the participants (Hypothesis 2), that there would be significant differences in social skills self-efficacy as a function of gender (Hypothesis 3), and that there would be significant associations between social skills efficacy and measures of proactivity (Hypothesis 4).

METHOD

Participants

Our sample consisted of 212 Native American adolescents from two urban public schools in a large city of over two million people in a Midwestern state. Participants were recruited from social studies classes in which a social skills training module was being offered by the researchers. Participants from 14 different tribes were represented in the sample. Participants were both school-identified and self-identified. Mean age was 13.15 years (SD = .97 years); 47.6% were boys (n = 101), and 52.4% were girls (n = 111). All participants who were recruited chose to participate. No research incentives were offered.

Instrumentation

Perceived Social Self-Efficacy Scale. The PSSE (Smith & Betz, 2000) consists of 25 items and assesses a broad range of social behaviors. Items are scored on a S-point Likert scale ranging from 1 (no confidence at all) to 5 (complete confidence), with higher scores indicating greater perceived social self-efficacy. Although initially developed for use with undergraduate college students, we judged that the scale was also relevant for younger adolescents due to the skills being measured, the relevance of the questions to younger adolescents, and the Flesch-Kincaid fifth-grade reading level of the instrument. Sample items from this scale are "Be involved in group activities" and "Find someone to spend a weekend afternoon with."

In the original norming group of 90 men and 264 women (mean age 18.8 years), internal consistency reliability was estimated at [alpha] = .94 across the entire scale. Social self-efficacy has been positively correlated with enterprising confidence and self-esteem, and negatively correlated with shyness and social anxiety (Smith & Betz, 2000).

Proactivity Skills for the New Economy. The PSNE was developed by three of the authors of this article as a self-report measure of those constructs making up proactivity as hypothesized in ICM theory. This instrument consists of five scales measuring Awareness of Opportunity (five items), Assertiveness (four items), Initiative (four items), Flexibility (four items), and Adaptability (five items). Sample items for these scales are Awareness of Opportunity ("I understand when circumstances have changed," "I take what I hear and turn it into action"); Assertiveness ("I make the most out of my opportunities," "I let others know about my strengths and talents"); Initiative ("I start something new on my own," "I boldly ask for what I want"); Flexibility ("I adjust easily to new situations," "I prepare myself for later opportunities"); and Adaptability ("I make constructive use of criticism," "I figure out problems").

In the norming sample of 244 urban adolescents (including 44% Native American adolescents), the PSNE Assertiveness and Adaptability scales correlated positively with the Assertiveness and Adaptability scales of the Work Adjustment Inventory (at r = .35 and r = .33, respectively). In addition, each of the PSNE scales have correlated positively with readiness to complete high school, goal setting skills, career exploration skills, and the ability to seek emotional and instrumental support. In the current sample, Cronbach's alpha reliabilities for the PSNE scales ranged from .70 to .82.

RESULTS

Hypothesis 1 stated that exploratory factor analysis would reveal a clear pattern of logically connected types of social skills among Native American adolescents. To test this hypothesis we conducted an exploratory factor analysis with a Varimax rotation on the Social Self-Efficacy Scale scores. Six constructs emerged: (1) Prosocial Skills (i.e., confidence in one's abilities to be altruistic, and to give and ask for help); (2) Leisure Skills (i.e., confidence in one's abilities to participate in leisure activities with others); (3) Interpersonal Skills (i.e., confidence in one's abilities to share experiences, express opinions, and keep up one's side of the conversation); (4) Group Skills (i.e., confidence in one's abilities to function as a member of a group); (5) Social Persistence (i.e., confidence in one's abilities to pursue social relationships in the face of obstacles); and (6) Leadership Skills (i.e., confidence in one's abilities to initiate and sustain working relationships with others).

Item loadings ranged from .54 to .81 on the Prosocial Skills factor, from .53 to .81 on the Leisure Skills factor, from .45 to .73 on the Interpersonal Skills factor, from .56 to .71 on the Group Skills factor, from 63 to .71 on the Social Persistence factor, and from .57 to .78 on the Leadership factor. Communalities ranged from .54 to .80. Percent of variance explained in social self-efficacy was 65.80%. Three items that were cross-loaded were dropped from further analysis. Each group of items relating to these factors was then scaled. Cronbach's alpha reliabilities for these subscales ranged from .73 to .84 in the current sample. Means and standard deviations for these subscales are reported in Table 1.

Hypothesis 2 stated that there would be significant within-group differences in the strength of social skills self-efficacy among the participants. To test this hypothesis, we conducted a within-subjects Multivariate Analysis of Variance on the six social skills efficacy subscales constructed from the previous factor analysis. As shown in Table 2, results indicated that Native American adolescents have significant differences in the strength of their various types of social skills self-efficacy (Wilks [lambda] F = 14.48, p < .001). Post-hoc paired-samples t tests indicated that Native American adolescents have significantly greater efficacy for Prosocial Skills than Leisure Skills (t = 4.61, p < .001), Group Skills (t = 4.70, p < .001), Social Persistence (t = 4.78, p < .001), and Leadership Skills (t = 8.14, p < .001). They had significantly greater efficacy for Leisure Skills than Interpersonal Skills (t = 3.29, p < .002), Group Skills (t = 3.04, p < .004), Social Persistence (t = 3.41, p < .002), and Leadership Skills (t = 6.68, p < .001). They had significantly greater efficacy for Interpersonal Skills than Leadership Skills (t = 3.56, p < .001); and significantly greater efficacy for Group Skills than Leadership Skills (t = 3.35, p < .002).

Hypothesis 3 stated that there would be significant differences in social skills self-efficacy as a function of gender. To test this hypothesis, we conducted a One-Way Analysis of Variance with gender as the independent variable, and the six types of perceived social self-efficacy as the dependent variables.

Results indicated that girls have significantly greater Prosocial Skills efficacy than boys (F = 6.08, p < .016), while boys may have greater Leadership efficacy than girls (F = 3.31, p < .071). There were no other differences in social skills self-efficacy as a function of gender.

Hypothesis 4 stated that there would be significant associations between social skills efficacy and measures of proactivity. To test this hypothesis we conducted point bi-serial correlations between the social skills self-efficacy subscales and the five proactivity skills scales from the PSNE among a randomly selected subset of participants in this study (n = 40). As shown in Table 1, results indicated that there were significant associations between Prosocial Skills and Awareness of Opportunity, Assertiveness, Initiative, and Adaptability; between Leisure Skills and Awareness of Opportunity; between Interpersonal Skills and Awareness of Opportunity, Initiative, Flexibility, and Adaptability; between Group Skills and Awareness of Opportunity, Assertiveness, Initiative, Flexibility, and Adaptability; between Persistence and Awareness of Opportunity, Initiative, and Adaptability; and between Leadership and Awareness of Opportunity, Initiative, and Flexibility.

DISCUSSION

The purpose of this study was to examine how Native American young people identify and understand social skills, to investigate differences in their level of efficaciousness for the various types of social skills they identify, and to explore how the various social skills identified are associated with proactivity skills as identified in the Integrative Contextual Model of Career Development (Lapan, 2004). Results suggest that Native American adolescents have a clear conceptualization of social skills, and that they clearly differentiate among various types of social skills. Results also suggest that Native American adolescents have greater efficacy for prosocial and leisure skills, and less efficacy for persistence and leadership skills. There is little difference between Native American boys' and girls' social skills efficacy, except that girls have significantly greater prosocial skills efficacy, and boys may have greater leadership skills efficacy than girls (although there was only a trend in the results to support this, p = .07).

Finally, results suggest that efficacy for various types of social skills are moderately related to indicators of proactivity. Specifically, awareness of opportunity is related to prosocial, leisure, interpersonal, group, social persistence, and leadership skills efficacy; assertiveness is related to prosocial and interpersonal skills efficacy; initiative is related to prosocial, interpersonal, group, social persistence, and leadership skills efficacy; flexibility is related to interpersonal, group, and leadership skills efficacy; and adaptability is related to prosocial, interpersonal, group, and social persistence skills efficacy.

Recommendations for Practitioners

Leong and Brown (1995) observed, "Theories tend to ignore or limitedly address the sociopolitical, socioeconomic, social-psychological, and sociocultural realities of cross-cultural individuals" (p. 146). They pointed out that discrimination and systematic bias affect career outcomes independent of the adequacy of one's behavior. However, we suggest that the effects of the sociocultural realities of career entry and success for Native American young people can be moderated through proactivity as it is related to the development of social skills. We further suggest that school counselors can be instrumental in enhancing the social skills strengths of Native American adolescents.

To help Native American students enhance their social skills strengths, we suggest that professional school counselors find ways to incorporate students' community and tribal values, cultures, traditions, and lifeways. For example, among many Native American tribes, the importance of community and collaboration are closely held values that foster prosocial, altruistic ways of interacting with others. Inviting Native American elders to the classroom to recount stories about how community members demonstrate empathy and kindness can assist students in understanding how they can effectively build upon their own strengths in prosocial skills, and in understanding how they can apply those types of skills to their own career development.

To help Native American adolescents build upon their strengths in leisure skills, school counselors can plan leisure events that are culturally specific for them. For example, school counselors can plan annual community meals in which Native American traditional food is served. During school dances, traditional Native American music and dancing can be included. School counselors also can support Native American student associations, through which social events can be planned that will both honor the cultures of Native American students and help other students in the schools learn about and honor Native Americans' cultures and traditions.

School counselors can assist Native American students in practicing their interpersonal and group skills through discussion groups. During these groups, students can identify various types of culture-specific communication styles. For example, in high-context, high-contact types of communication (typically found in cultures where there is a high level of mutually understood, contextualized information), such as is found in many Native American communities, speech tends to be ambiguous, indirect, understated, and assumed to be known by others. In low-context, low-contact types of communication (typically found in cultures where there is a low level of mutually understood, contextualized information), such as is found in many majority communities, speech tends to be explicit, open, precise, and direct (Gudykunst, 1998). Native American students can be encouraged to identify the differences between these two types of speech, so that they can choose the skills they want to increase as they practice intentional communication strategies. Through discussion groups, students also can practice their group skills. For example, in these groups, students can practice such skills as setting group norms, being aware of group dynamics, and cultivating the goodwill and cooperation of both in-group and out-group members.

Native American adolescents can enhance their skills in social persistence through a support/challenge model of individual or group counseling. In the support/challenge model, counselors help students (a) identify a particularly difficult social task or situation, (b) reframe the task as an opportunity to practice particular social skills of their choosing, (c) engage in social problem solving, (d) reengage in the situation with the support of their counselors, (e) fine-tune the skills they want to practice, and (f) generalize what they have practiced to other social circumstances.

Native American students can build on their leadership skills through establishing leadership groups. The National Youth Leadership Council (NYLC) has developed one model that has been shown to be particularly effective in teaching leadership skills to Native American students. Using this model, students are taught to identify service-learning projects that increase the quality of life in their communities. Projects are identified by the youth in collaboration with Native American leaders and educators, who also can serve as mentors and partners in the completion of their projects. The projects are carefully tied to the school curriculum, as well as to the specific needs of the students' communities.

Using the NYLC leadership model, students identify the project they wish to complete, the steps required for completion, and the resources needed. After completing their projects, students play critical roles in evaluating the effectiveness of their efforts. Service learning projects can address such issues as hunger, homelessness, diversity, health, environmental concerns, and improved educational experiences for younger children. Service learning is experiential, collaborative, reflective, and in accordance with learning style preferences identified among many Native American adolescents (Pewewardy, 2002). The NYLC model provides students with opportunities to practice their social, group, and community leadership skills as they engage in service learning. Finally, school counselors can use the Perceived Social Skills Self-Efficacy Scale (Smith & Betz, 2000) to assess the social skills development of individual Native American students. The scale is brief, easy to complete, and can provide stimulus information for counselors and students to discuss in planning individualized social skills interventions.

Limitations

Limitations of this study include the potential non-generalizability of findings to rural Native American young people. Therefore, we suggest that this study be replicated with Native American young people who live in more rural communities. A second limitation is that only self-report and not observational data were collected. Issues underlying the enhancement of social skills self-efficacy among Native American adolescents may be better understood using multiple methods of data collection.

Conclusion

The ASCA National Model[R] (American School Counselor Association, 2005) specifies that school counselors ensure that every student has equitable access to services that include the identification and delivery of the knowledge and skills all students should acquire. This study supports these goals through the identification of important social skills and the exploration of how these skills are related to other indicators of career development among Native American adolescents. This study also supports the use of ICM theory in meeting the service and delivery goals of the ASCA National Model with respect to Native American young people.

In addition, this study meets the standards defined by the ASCA National Model in that suggestions are made through which Native American students learn to employ strategies to achieve future career goals with success and satisfaction. School counselors who assist Native American students in the development of social skills can help them position themselves to more successfully take advantage of the many opportunities that are available in our new, more globalized, more pluralistic economy.

References

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Sherri L. Turner is an assistant professor in Counseling and Student Personnel Psychology, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis. E-mail: [e-mail] Julia L. Conkel, Allison N. Reich, Michelle J.Trotter, and Jason J. Siewart also are with the University of Minnesota.

Table 1. Correlations Among the Social Skills Self-Efficacy Subscales
and Proactivity Skills for New Economy Scales

Social Skill        Mean       SD         1         2         3

1. Prosocial        3.71       .81               .55 ***   .55 ***
2. Leisure          3.65       .89                         .54 ***
3. Interpersonal    3.45       .93
4. Group            3.44       .90
5. Persistence      3.44       .89
6. Leadership       3.24       .91
7. Awareness        3.75       .61
8. Assertiveness    3.86       .67
9. Initiative       3.73       .72
10. Flexibility     3.76       .67
11. Adaptability    3.82       .60

Social Skill          4         5         6         7         8

1. Prosocial       .55 ***   .55 ***   .55 ***   .33 *     .45 **
2. Leisure         .41 ***   .51 ***   .53 ***   .53 ***   .16
3. Interpersonal   .40 ***   .56 ***   .49 ***   .43 **    .27
4. Group                     .40 ***   .57 ***   .49 ***   .43 **
5. Persistence                         .69 ***   .45 **    .24
6. Leadership                                    .35 *     .23
7. Awareness                                               .56 ***
8. Assertiveness
9. Initiative
10. Flexibility
11. Adaptability

Social Skill          9        10        11

1. Prosocial       .35 *     .23       .37 *
2. Leisure         .06       .17       .10
3. Interpersonal   .42 **    .35 *     .48 **
4. Group           .47 ***   .59 ***   .41 **
5. Persistence     .43 **    .29       .39 *
6. Leadership      .31 *     .38 *     .26
7. Awareness       .70 ***   .63 ***   .67 ***
8. Assertiveness   .50 ***   .46 ***   .57 ***
9. Initiative                .49 ***   .58 ***
10. Flexibility                        .55 ***
11. Adaptability

Note. Prosocial = Prosocial social skills efficacy; Awareness =
awareness of opportunity. * p < .05. ** p < .01. *** p < .001.

Table 2. Paired-Samples t Tests of the
Social Self-Efficacy Subscales (N = 211)

                                Mean
                             Difference   SD        t        p

Prosocial--leisure              .06       .81   -1.11       .268
Prosocial--interpersonal        .27       .82    4.61 ***   .000
Prosocial--group                .27       .82    4.70 ***   .000
Prosocial--persistence          .27       .81    4.78 ***   .000
Prosocial--leadership           .47       .82    8.14 ***   .000
Leisure--interpersonal          .20       .87    3.29 **    .001
Leisure--group                  .21       .97    3.04 **    .003
Leisure--persistence            .21       .88    3.41 **    .001
Leisure--leadership             .41       .87    6.68 ***   .000
Interpersonal--group            .01       .85     .11       .912
Interpersonal--persistence      .08       .87     .30       .765
Interpersonal--leadership       .20       .82    3.56 ***   .000
Group--persistence              .01       .98     .06       .954
Group--leadership               .20       .85    3.35 **    .001
Persistence--leadership         .20       .71    3.95 ***   .000

* p < .05. ** p < .01. *** p < .001.