Adolescent Values, Interest in Extracurricular Activities and Bonding to School: A Cross-sectional Descriptive and...

The goal of this paper is to explore relations between adolescent values, interests in activities and their bonding to school. This paper presents survey research findings that examine 1,928 6^th and 7^th grade students' responses to survey prompts about 15 terminal values adapted from Rokeach's (1973) theory of values, prompts about 11 activities they may be interested in, and questions about how attached they felt to school. The goal of analysis is to document the relative importance of each terminal value for this sample. In addition, relation between values, activities of interest and bonding to school were estimated. All 15 values were ranked as important. Among the more highly ranked values for the sample were acceptance, independence, character, fitness and achievement. Least important overall were faith, wealth, fame, creativity and stewardship. Factor analysis resulted in three general categories that described activities of interest: interest in athletics, interest in the arts, and interest in technology. Students' bonding to school varied based on gender and grade, with females and younger students being generally more bonded to school. There were strong correlations between valuing fitness and having an interest in athletic activities (r = .599) and valuing education and having an interest in the arts (r = .340). Bonding to school was strongly correlated with only two values: education (r = .435) and character (r = .335). Having an interest in technology was not correlated with any of the 15 values or students' bonding to school. Results suggest that interventions and policies that wish to improve bonding to school might do well to take advantage of existing highly ranked positive values and provide an opportunity for students to engage in a wide array of activities of interest.