Bridging Disciplinary Boundaries (January 11 - 14, 2007)

Purpose: Help seeking and utilization of support systems by adolescents have a positive effect on adolescents and are considered necessary ingredients for successful transitions to adulthood. Adolescents who actively ask for help are associated with a reduction in emotional and behavioral problems. Unfortunately, adolescents do not often ask for help in general and for professional help in particular. The purpose of this study is to examine the predictors which are associated with the willingness of Jewish and Arab Israeli adolescents to ask for help. Emphasis is placed on the differences between formal and informal help seeking and on gender and ethnic differences.

Methods: The data was collected by the Minerva Center for Youth Policy at the University of Haifa as part of their national survey on attitudes and values of adolescents in Israel. The sample consisted of 6,017 randomly selected Jewish and Arab Israeli adolescents 14-18 years old, who attended 360 randomly selected high schools.

The dependent variables were formal and informal help seeking, which are scales constructed through factor analysis. The independent variables include satisfaction with school, family and peers, altruism, achievement motivation, overall anxiety, fear of violent victimization, gender, nationality and family income. Principle component analyses were employed to confirm the validity of the composite variables. In the data analysis phase, logistic regressions were used in order to explore what predicts formal vs. informal help seeking among Jewish and Arab Israeli adolescents. Based on the logistic regression results, multivariate profiles of help seeking were developed.

Results: Findings indicate that youth in Israel are willing to seek informal help when in need and that females seek more help than males. Satisfaction with school, family, and peers are significantly related to informal help seeking, and only school satisfaction is related to formal help seeking. School satisfaction affected males' help seeking but not females. In addition, altruism and achievement orientation are positively related to seeking both formal and informal help. While fear of violent victimization is a strong predictor of formal help seeking, anxiety, on the other hand, is related to informal help seeking only. Contrary to expectations, it was found that youth from Arab Israeli minority groups were more willing to seek help than Jewish Israeli youth.

Implications: These findings are discussed from both the Israeli perspectives of youth having to live in a stressful environment and constant fear of terror, and the Arab perspective of a small minority living in Israel. The findings are also discussed with regard to general help seeking theories and empirical evidence. Specific suggestions for enhancing help seeking among adolescents are presented, especially how to increase formal help and how to target boys from both ethnic groups.