Mobilizing Adults for Positive Youth Development

E. Gil Clary, Ph.D., is chair of the department of psychology at the College of St. Catherine in St. Paul, Minnesota. He teaches General Psychology, Experimental Social Psychology, and Personality Theories. Furthermore, he has taught, in collaboration with colleagues in other departments, two honors seminars, one on autobiographies, and a second on the meaning of work.

He completed his education at the University of Georgia (B.A. in psychology, 1975; M.S. in psychology, 1978; Ph. D. in social psychology, 1980). In 1979, he joined the faculty of the College of St. Catherine, first as an instructor (1979-1980), then assistant professor (1980-1985), associate professor (1985-1992), and professor (1992). From 1989 to 1992, Clary was the Endowed Professor of the Sciences at the College of St. Catherine. In 1997, he assumed the position of chair of the department of psychology.
Most of Clary's research centers on the psychology of helping, with much of this focusing on people's involvement in volunteer activities and other forms of community services. More specifically, this research has examined the motivations underlying participation in volunteer work, and with Mark Snyder (University of Minnesota) and other colleagues, this work has resulted in a psychometrically sound inventory for assessing motivations underlying involvement in volunteer work. Finally, this interest in volunteerism recently resulted in a study of the effects of educational programs requiring students to volunteer.


Jean E. Rhodes, Ph.D., is a professor in the Department of Psychology, University of Massachusetts, Boston. She has written extensively on the role of mentors in promoting positive developmental outcomes among children and adolescents. In addition to studying natural mentors, she and her colleagues have analyzed longitudinal data that were collected from over 1,000 urban adolescents who participated in a national study of Big Brothers BigSisters. The predictors and effects of relationship duration have been studied, as well as the processes that govern mentors' influence. Her findings provide ample evidence of the extraordinary potential of mentoring relationships, while also exposing the rarely acknowledged risk for harm that unsuccessful relationships can render. A deeper understanding of these important relationships may lead to interventions and policies that better address the needs of youth.

Rhodes is currently involved in studies on the role of supportive relationships in the lives of: young mothers; students in school and after-school settings; and immigrant youth. She is a Fellow of APA and the Society for Community Research and Action, a member of the MacArthur Network on the Transition to Adulthood, and author of a monthly research column for the National Mentoring Partnership. Her book, Stand by me: The risks and rewards of youth mentoring, was published by Harvard University Press in Spring 2002.