Effects of Participation in Community Activities on Self-Efficacy of Japanese Junior High School Students

Evaluating how participating in various experiences affects young people is important to promote further participation in community practices. We examined the effects of participation on junior-high school students’ self-efficacy and motivation towards community-improvement activities: of 114 students from a junior high school (Study 1) and 10 voluntarily participated in a park-design project (Study 2). The experience of participation even in small-scaled contributed to increasing the self-efficacy of the participants and especially enhancing their motivation with regard to community empowerment.