AN EXPLORATORY, RANDOMIZED STUDY OF THE IMPACT OF MENTORING ON THE SELF-EFFICACY AND COMMUNITY-BASED KNOWLEDGE OF ADOLESCENTS WITH SEVERE PHYSICAL CHALLENGES

Adolescents with severe physical challenges face many obstacles to the ir development of self-efficacy and community independence, Potentiall y, one important source for the promotion of adolescent competence is exposure to successful role models with similar challenges. The purpos e of this study was to conduct an exploratory, randomized field-test o f the impact of mentoring by role models on the self-efficacy, disabil ity-related self-efficacy, community-based self-confidence, and commun ity-based knowledge of adolescents with severe physical challenges. Th e study also aimed to determine the impact of mentoring on the percept ions held by parents regarding the capabilities and community based kn owledge of their children. A two-independent group, randomized block d esign was used to evaluate the impact of mentoring. Students in the ex perimental group performed twelve activities with their mentors over t he course of six months. Results indicated that youth exposed to mento rs demonstrated significantly higher levels of disability-related self -efficacy, community-based knowledge and self-confidence than youth in the control group. Furthermore, the parents of experimental group par ticipants perceived their children to be significantly more competent and to possess significantly more community-based knowledge than the p arents of subjects in the control group. Implications of these finding s are discussed and the need for additional research emphasized.