Root Causes: Youth Civic Engagement

What are the Forces and Influences at Work?

• Early Opportunities for Involvement: In part, the civic skills, habits and motivations of young adults result from opportunities for engagement during childhood and adolescence.  Children and teens who have opportunities for involvement in extracurricular activities and community institutions are more likely to vote and participate in other forms of civic engagement as young adults. [1]  

• Education: Education has been shown to have a significant impact on youth civic engagement.  Research suggests that both the educational experiences of youth themselves and the educational experience of their parents have an impact on whether or not young adults vote. Dropping out of high school decreases young adult voter turnout by 19 percent for white adults, 11 percent for black adults and 10 percent for Hispanic adults. In 2008 the voter turnout for young people without college experience was 36 percent, compared with 62 percent for their peers with college experience. [2] Additionally, parental education has been found to be a more powerful predictor of young adult voting than either parental income or profession.  Having well-educated parents increases the normative pressure to be engaged in the civic process, thereby providing youth with an early introduction to civic engagement and establishing voting early on as a important right and responsibility.    

• Socio-Economic Factors:  The relationship between social class and political participation has been referred to as the “best documented finding in American political behavior research.” [3] Social and class disparities in civic participation often begin during a person’s teenage years and are intensified by the lack of opportunity to practice civic participation in their communities and schools.  For instance, schools in less privileged neighborhoods have fewer opportunities for learning about and engaging in civic activities and service learning. [4]   

• Arrests and Felonies: Participating in civic engagement opportunities as a teen reduces risky behavior.  Unfortunately, when teens engage in risky behavior and are arrested, it dramatically impacts the likelihood that they will be civically engaged as young adults.  One of the two specific events during youth that are associated with reduced rates of civic engagement, is being arrested (the other is dropping out of high school).  Studies, which controlled for both growing up in disadvantaged families and neighborhoods, show that youth who report having been arrested between tenth and twelfth grade – have reduced voter participation by 7 percent for white adults and 21 percent for black adults. [5] Additionally, felony convictions serve as a major barrier for civic engagement, mostly effecting poor people and people of color. [6] Currently, 35 states prohibit persons on parole from voting and 30 of these states exclude persons on probation as well. Four states deny the right to vote to all persons with felony convictions, even after they have completed their sentences. [7] Forty-seven states ban felons from serving on juries, and forty states ban former felons from serving in public office. [8]   

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