YOUTH MENTORING - INVESTIGATION OF RELATIONSHIP CHARACTERISTICS AND PERCEIVED BENEFITS

This research examined associations among characteristics of relations hips formed in two community-based mentoring programs and their linkag es with ratings of perceived benefits for youth. Volunteer mentors in a Big Brothers/Big Sisters program completed a questionnaire on a mont hly basis for a period of six months, whereas undergraduate students s erving as mentors through a service-learning course completed a questi onnaire on one occasion only. Mentors' ratings of emotional closeness with youth were found to be associated with reports of fewer contacts with program staff and relationship obstacles in each program. Reports of more extensive amounts of mentor-youth contact and feelings of clo seness were, in turn, each associated with ratings of greater benefits for youth. Findings also indicated a tendency for mentors in longer t erm relationships in the Big Brothers/Big Sisters program to perceive greater benefits for youth, but this was evident only after controllin g for a countervailing tendency of mentors in these relationships to r eport spending less time with youth. Implications for the design and e valuation of youth mentoring programs are discussed. (C) 1997 John Wil ey & Sons, Inc.