THE ROLE OF THE ROLE MODEL

"Having a role model in life is a great thing to have; one who provides us with direction and inspiration. However, we will forever be restricted by that person's limitations if we live within their boundaries. Be influenced, but set your own standards and develop your own principals, if you are ever to live beyond someone else's dreams."

---Jason Shahan

Role Models and Youth Work

The youth worker as a ‘positive’ role model is deeply engrained in the psyche of the vocation, from the early church, uniformedboys and girls clubs of the 19th Century to present day statutory and voluntary interventions in the lives of young people. It is embedded in the Occupational Standards for Youth Work which highlight those behaviours that youth workers should be looking to pass on to the young people they work with, such as “Model behaviour which demonstrates a commitment to inclusion, equality of opportunity and of valuing diversity” (National Occupational Standards for Youth Work; 2.3.2[1]).

Within formal and informal educational settings, Daniel Rose (Infed, 2004[2]) describes role models as “not concerned with the imparting of knowledge and information… rather [its] aim is to expose target groups to specific attitudes, lifestyles and outlooks.” The role model is therefore not necessarily a teacher or a mentor, but an inspiration for how a person may choose to live their life. Rose goes on to say that the role model as a tool is particularly stressed in informal education settings such as youth movements, “…where the sometimes charismatic educational leader embodies the values that he or she is espousing”.

Despite this, in summer 2010 when YouthLink Scotland asked members to prioritise subject areas of importance to them, ‘Role Models’ came seventeenth out of a list of twenty, suggesting youth workers do not see role models as a priority of their work. This opinion appears to be echoed amongst the young people they work with. When 2,000 young people aged 11 – 25 were asked about their role models for YouthLink Scotland’s 2009 Being Young in Scotland Survey[3], only 3% of young people saw youth workers as a role model while around 60% saw family members as a source of inspiration in their lives.

These findings, however, could be misleading. Firstly, while the terms “modelling behaviour”, “be an example”, and “demonstrating” are frequently used within the sector, particularly in relation to mentoring, befriending, training peer educators and other well known best practices,there is limited research on the role of “role models” in youth work, therefore interpretation and understanding of the term and what it means in practice varies widely across the sector.

Secondly we need to consider the fact that many youth workers are not always defined by young people as ‘youth workers’ but can be termed ‘Scout Leaders’, ‘Community Workers’, ‘Project Workers’, or hold a range of other titles.Therefore when young people are asked who their role models are the term “youth worker” may not necessarily arise.

Finally, we must recognise that to harness the impact of a role model to influence a young person’s life within a youth work setting, a youth worker does not necessarily need to be a role model himself or herself. Instead they can use the influence of other role models through alternate means. Indeed many youth workers may already do so unconsciously.

The influence of role models has been recognised by organisations such as the Royal Society[4] who are encouraging role model programmes to stimulate interest in science. These programmes involve role models being brought in from outside the learning environment to show young people how science works in the real world. They found that “[A role model’s] relationship with the ideas they are conveying and the reason for their presence… are seen by the children as different to that of teachers. Their work in the “real world” and their obvious enthusiasm for their subject and ability bring [it] to life, combined with the absence of an explicit teacher/student relationship all help to engage the young people directly”. In research on the views of young people the Royal Society found that communication, enthusiasm, informality, friendliness and openness, and an approach which broadens horizons are important positive qualities in role models. These are traits that are built into youth work[5][6].

‘Role models’ (being a role model) and ‘role modelling’ (utilising role models) could be an important element of youth work and it is an area that, given its potential benefits and risks, should be explored further. This paper will look at how role models fit within current informal/social learning/education theory and practice, with a view to stimulating discussion on the subject within the sector.

Role Models in Informal Education

The purpose of youth work is to “enable young people to develop holistically, working with them to facilitate their personal, social and educational development, to enable them to develop their voice, influence and place in society and to reach their potential”[7] through informal education and learning. This approach is often termed ‘social education’ and is understood as enabling young people to become more conscious of and to better understand ‘self’. Traditionally informal education focuses on relationships and therefore on the process by which learning happens rather than on what is learnt (Doyle, 2001[8]).

Wenger (2005)[9] suggested that there are four components of a social theory of learning:

  • Meaning: when young people learn as they experience
  • Practice: when young people learn by doing
  • Community: when young people learn by belonging
  • Identity: when young people learn by becoming

The usage of role models can be embedded in every component of social learning. They can be used as:examples of personal attributes, inspiration in the search for knowledge, an embodiment of values, an aspiration to aim for, or a standard of behaviour. These spheres of influence are all interconnected and role models may touch on more than one of these aspects of a young person’s life.

Meaning

The idea of learning through experience, also known as ‘experiential learning’, is one well established in both theory and research. It has two aspects, the first of which is described by Mark K Smith (Infed, 1996, 2001[10]) as “learning that is achieved through reflection upon everyday experience and is the way that most of us do our learning”. Probably the best known typology of this type of learning is Kolb’s learning circle that involves (1) experiencing followed by (2) reflecting followed by (3) generalising followed by (4) applying.

To effectively learn from experience, you need to be able to reflect and understand that experience.In the words of Blacker (2001[11]), “To have experience alone, it would seem, is not enough. We have to engage in certain thought processes in order to learn effectively. Sometimes we do this naturally, other times we do not and miss the opportunity to learn from an experience that may be of importance to our development”. This is recognised in the Occupational Standards which requires youth workers to ‘enable young people to use their learning to enhance their future development’. The standard is about “enabling young people to reflect on their learning, learning from their experience, and to apply this in other areas of their lives, establishing goals for their future development”. Youth workers therefore have a key role in helping young people to reflect back on experience and may use role models to facilitate this process.

For example, a young person may have said something inappropriate without realising they have done so. The youth worker has a responsibility to help the young person to understand why what they said was inappropriate and the impact it may have on others. In some cases the youth worker may have made that same mistake themselves at some point in the past and will be able to discuss what they learnt from the experience with the young person, thus giving the young person the opportunity to recognise a negative behavioural example and explore the influence of the youth worker on their behaviour. Alternatively, the youth worker may be able to direct the young person to the behaviour of other people, perhaps famous, perhaps local, to help them to understand why what they said was not appropriate. In other words,the youth worker can help a young person deconstruct and improve their understanding of role models, signpost to an appropriate role model, or be a role model themselves in order to help the young person to learn from that experience.

Practice

Learning from doing is the second aspect of ‘experiential learning’, described by Mark K Smith (Infed, 1996, 2001[12]) as “the sort of learning undertaken by students who are given the chance to acquire and apply knowledge, skills and feelings in an immediate and relevant setting”. An example of this form of learning through youth work is the Duke of Edinburgh’s Award, which asks young people to get involved in a range of activities and projects.All forms of youth work use this form of learning to a greater or lesser extent.

When running these activities the youth worker can take a number of approaches dependant on the young person’s experience and confidence. These could be directive, consultative, or enabling.

With any approach the youth worker has the potential to be role model for the young people to emulate by demonstrating how decisions should be made. Alternativelythe youth worker can use other people as role models to provide inspiration for ideas for discussion. The youth worker may find that some of the young peoplewill provide positive standards of contribution that the rest of the group can be gently encouraged to follow without overtly putting them on a pedestal. This is known as the “Diffusion of Innovation Theory” which posits that certain individuals (opinion leaders) from a given population act as agents of behavioural change by disseminating information and influencing group norms in their community (Rogers, 1983[13])”

Community

Similar, but slightly different to the Diffusion of Innovation Theory, the Theory of Reasoned Action states that one of the influential elements for behavioural change is an individual’s perceptions of social norms and beliefs about what people who are important to the individual do or think about a particular behaviour (Fishbein and Ajzen, 1975[14]). In other words,youth workers can help young people to learn by creating a learning environment to which the young person can belong and where they are surrounded by examples of the attributes, knowledge, values, aspirations and behaviour that youth workers are looking to pass on and develop.

A learning environment has many facets: physical, emotional, social and political. One of the ways that youth workers look to influence the emotional, social and political aspect of the environment is to train ‘peer educators’, ‘mentors’ or ‘befrienders’ from amongst the young people they work with.

In his article (Infed, 2002[15]) Parsons states that “Where youth groups have been successful it has always been because there have been role models to whom young people could relate and respond” he goes on to say that “To be a credible role model to whom others relate it is necessary to share the conditions in which the members of the group live. Really to understand a person, to give them hope where previously no hope existed, it is necessary to demonstrate by one’s own life that the problems they are up against can be overcome; that good can come of evil; that to rise above seemingly impossible hurdles is achievable.” Parsons goes on to suggest that many youth workers may not live in the same locality as the young people they work with and therefore will not have the benefit of shared experience.

Unlike the youth worker who may not necessarily have the shared experience, as noted by Parson, peer educators are more likely to be seen as role models by young people as they come from the same backgroundas their peers and because they have progressed themselves through the youth work process. They therefore have an intimate knowledge of the benefits and challenges of youth work which they can demonstrate, embody and be ambassadors for within the group.

Another view of role models depicts them as “cognitive constructions devised by individuals to construct their ideal or ‘possible’ selves based on their own developing needs and goals. Rather than focusing on the actions of a prominent person [it] focuses on the perceptions of the individual. The individual is seen as piecing together a composite role model from attributes derived from a range of possibilities, both real and imagined. The emphasis in this view is on an active learning process from multiple role models, rather than a focus of selecting a particular exemplary person.” (Donald E Gibson, 2006[16]). This means that where youth workers are aware of a young person’s needs and goals, they have the opportunity within a youth club’s learning environment to direct them to individuals within the youth group or in the wider world who, whilst they may not embody the young person’s ideal, may inspire them to see how they could learn and develop as an individual.

Identity

Social learning theory asserts that people serve as models of human behaviour and that some people (significant others) are capable of eliciting behavioural change in certain individuals, based on the individuals’ value and interpretation systems (Bandura, 1986[17]).

When thinking about role models, people usually interpret the term to mean a young person aiming to ‘become’ their role model. Arguably, this is also the reason youth workers see role models as relatively unimportant in youth work. Informal education, as we have already noted, is about the process of learning as much as, if not more than, the end product of who the young person chooses to become. But beyond this, youth work aims to “enable young people to develop their voice, influence and place in society and to reach their potential”.In other words, to become empowered individuals in their own right. There is a risk that in becoming like someone else, a young person may lose the sense of their own identity – something fundamentally at odds with the aim and purpose of youth work.

We also need to consider the question of whether a young person’s role model is a positive or negative influence and therefore worth identifying with. Anton A Bucher (1997[18]) noted that “Plato mentioned [role model’s] impact in forming moral consciousness. He warned against bad models, especially gods and heroes in Homer’s epic poems. Young people would imitate their immoral behaviour and adopt their immoral values and attitudes”. This concern about the impact of role models on impressionable young people is frequently mentioned in the media in relation to today’s celebrities and sports men and women.It is also sometimes mentioned in reaction to the media itself promoting negative role models for young people to follow. Concerns have also been highlighted about the influence of local personalities or family members on impressionable young people. One example of this is the current debate around young people with a parent addicted to drugs or alcohol, as highlighted in the Scottish Government’s Hidden Harm and Getting it Right for Every Child strategies.At the same time it can be argued that in some instances the service providers delivering the Government’s priorities are themselves not necessarily modelling acceptable standards of behaviour. It is clear that young people must untangle a multiplicity of contradictory messages as they look to establish their own sense of identity.

Finally, there is a concern that by looking to ‘become’ their role model, the young person may be harbouring unrealistic expectations.Craig (2007[19]) states that “Children often have unrealistic hopes about their futures – few will end up being the dashing football star, the celebrity singer or model… [youth workers] must remember that the lives of children and young people are not dominated by their attendance at school or their engagement with professionals… young people’s hopes are grounded in their life experience outside school and in their own personal ambitions” Craig goes on to say that, “ The best teachers are those who help open up a young person’s ambition and the breadth of their world view and manage to support the young person’s hope of operating successfully in that expanded world”.

This issue of learning by becoming is one which, potentially, has many risks to the young person and is hencea particular challenge for the youth worker. Whilst we do not want to discourage a young person’s ambition, we have a duty to help them to understand both the positives and negatives of following in another person’s footsteps so that they can decide for themselves what aspect of that person they most admire and decide whether or not their expectations are realistic. No person, well known or otherwise, is infallible and young people looking for role models to look up to must be able to recognise this. Youth workersshould help young people in the deconstruction and understanding of their role models to enable them to use role models effectively.This may be particularly true where the youth worker themselves is seen as a role model by the young person.