Environmental civic engagement (ECE) (i.e., peoples’ collaborative action to address a common issue; Flanagan & Bundick, 2011), has been recognized as a way to mitigate climate change effects (Gelissen, 2007). In fact, environmental values (EVs) and specifically, perception of socializers’ EVs (Chawla, 1999) have been recognized in ECE of emerging adults. However, perceived EVs of teachers has not been studied yet despite educational institutions’ role in student values/behavior (e.g., Husin & Saleh, 2019). Additionally, the role of emotions between EVs and engagement (e.g., Li et al., 2022), and ECE’s connection with well-being (Martin et al., 2020) has also been indicated. Thus, the relationship between emerging adults’ perception of parents, teachers, and peers' EVs and their own ECE was examined along with the role of emotional relatedness with nature, besides the contribution of ECE to well-being.

Results from path analysis on 71 university students (80.3% women; Mage = 23.13, SD = 2.94) indicated that emerging adults’ perception of only their peers’ EVs was related to their own emotional relatedness with nature, β = .514, p < .001, and perception of their parents’ EVs was linked to their own ECE, β = .267, p = .037. However, perception of teachers, β = -.119, p = .470; and peers' EVs, β = .109, p = .555; were not related to their own ECE, nor did emotional relatedness with nature mediate the relationship between ECE and perceived EVs of parents, β = .001, p = .971; teachers, β = .000, p = .999; and peers, β = .010, p = .911, respectively. ECE was not related to well-being, β = .195, p = .076.

Findings highlight the important role of parental values in ECE besides the new value-emotion connection, thus contributing to policy making besides the possible role of interventions in ECE.

This three-study dissertation investigated similarities and differences between personal and vicarious life story narratives, specifically high point, low point, and turning point memories, within romantic couples.

In Study 1 (N = 64, Mage = 28.15, SD = 5.76), qualitative analyses examined the thematic overlap between personal and vicarious narratives. Results showed that themes in personal life stories were closely mirrored in vicarious life stories.

Study 2 (N = 314, Mage = 25.61, SD = 4.33) employed a mixed-methods design to investigate phenomenological characteristics (valence, vividness) and autobiographical memory functions (self, social, and directive). Gender differences were also explored. Findings indicated positive associations between personal and vicarious narratives on memory functions. Personal narratives, however, were consistently rated higher on self, social, and directive functions, as well as vividness across all narrative types. For valence, only personal high point memories were rated more positively than their vicarious counterparts. In addition, no gender differences were observed.

Study 3 (N = 238, Mage = 21.11, SD = 1.06) replicated Study 2, confirming that phenomenological characteristics and memory functions in personal narratives were positively associated with their vicarious counterparts. Again, personal narratives were rated higher on functions and vividness across all narrative points and on the valence of high point memories, with no gender differences observed.

Overall, these findings suggest that the ways individuals recall their personal pasts are closely connected to how they remember the significant experiences of close others, particularly romantic partners. Although personal narratives were generally richer in autobiographical memory functions and emotional tone, vicarious memories showed parallel phenomenology and functions, underscoring their psychological significance.

The overall aim of this PhD project is to examine the role of resilience in Finnish university students’ coping and well-being during and after the COVID-19 pandemic. The data come from the “University students' motivation and well-being during and after the COVID-19 pandemic” (COPE) project, which includes four measurement points between 2021-2023 (total N ≈ 3000).

Study 1 will examine how resilience predicts coping strategies using cross-sectional data from the first measurement point (May–June 2020). Latent profile analysis will be used to identify coping profiles. At least three coping profiles are expected: highly functional, generally low, and dysfunctional. We hypothesize that higher resilience increases the likelihood of functional coping, while perceived demands and COVID-19 anxiety predict dysfunctional coping.

Study 2 will explore how changes in resilience relate to burnout and engagement between the second (December 2020-January 2021) and third (May-June 2021) measurement points through latent change score analysis. We expect declines in both resilience and the different indicators of well-being, with these changes being interrelated, so that a decline in resilience is correlated with increased burnout and reduced engagement.

Study 3 will investigate resilience as a moderator in the relationship between perceived demands and recovery across four measurement points (May 2020–March 2023) using linear mixed models. Recovery is expected to decline during the pandemic and improve by 2023. We also hypothesize that perceived demands negatively affect recovery, with the effect being stronger for individuals with lower resilience.

This research will contribute to understanding how resilience shapes coping and well-being trajectories, offering insights to inform interventions that build resilience and support mental health in higher education. The result of this work will also help individuals and universities prepare for new unexpected challenges and situations.

Understanding how early life experiences shape life satisfaction in emerging adulthood requires flexible and innovative methodological approaches. This study adopts an inductive, data-driven framework to identify and predict patterns of young adult life satisfaction using secondary longitudinal data from the “Future of Families and Child Wellbeing Study” (FFCWS; 1998–2024). The FFCWS is a birth cohort study that began in 1998 with nearly 5,000 children born in large U.S. cities, mostly to unmarried parents. It follows families across seven waves — data was collected at ages 0, 1, 3, 5, 9, 15, and 22, capturing detailed, multi-informant data on health, parenting, family relationships, socioeconomic conditions, neighborhood contexts, education, employment, and psychological functioning.

This study aims to explore which family, contextual, and developmental factors best predict life satisfaction in early adulthood. The methodological process includes four key stages: (1) selecting variables across multiple waves that may serve as developmental predictors for life satisfaction and (2) using supervised learning techniques (e.g., classification models) to predict life satisfaction later in life.

The approach centers on leveraging the longitudinal structure of the data to capture developmental processes over time, without imposing assumptions about variable relationships. Data preprocessing includes techniques for handling missing data, normalizing distributions, and balancing class frequencies. Model performance will be evaluated using classification metrics.

The presentation will focus on the methodological advantages of applying machine learning to developmental data and discuss the potential of inductive approaches to generate novel hypotheses about the predictors of life satisfaction.

Gender-based violence has been declared a public health problem by the World Health Organisation (2013). Delving into the psychogenesis of these violent behaviours can be key to understanding the nature of violent dynamics, as well as the antecedents from which to prevent the escalation of violence. The onset of romantic relationships, in adolescence, marks the beginning of the risk of the development of violent phenomena such as violence in adolescent romantic relationships. This dynamic is characterised by the use of aggression occasionally and in severe manifestations, with psychological, physical or sexual behaviour, face-to-face or virtually, in a dynamic of reciprocal and bidirectional aggression. The interpretation of these behaviours has harmful intentions and unpleasant consequences for both partners. This type of violence is a phenomenon in itself that can act as a prelude to gender-based violence. The research that has been designed as a doctoral thesis project aims to deepen the analysis of these possible relationships, identifying the individual variables and the dynamics of interpersonal relationships of affective intimacy that could be marking the differences between the escalation and continuity of violence and the breaking of the violent circle. To this end, the methodology includes results from three time periods, in order to be able to carry out in-depth longitudinal statistical analyses. As a result, two studies have been carried out so far, one of them longitudinal, which show the relationship between variables such as well-being and quality of the partner and intimate partner violence. The starting hypotheses consider that there is a relationship between different individual, contextual and relationship dynamics variables and the rate of involvement in dating violence as a risk factor for intimate partner violence.

There is a knowledge gap about the implementation and sustained use of evidence-based parenting programs (EBPP) in real-world settings, particularly when delivered to families at psychosocial risk. This PhD research aimed to address this gap with four empirical studies within the field of implementation science. Through a scoping review, Study 1 mapped the evidence on the implementation of EBPPs under real-world conditions and identified knowledge gaps. This study revealed that implementation outcomes are usually not reported, with fidelity being the most reported outcome and sustainability one of the least reported. The remaining three studies addressed the implementation outcomes of the Standard Triple P (STP) parenting program with families involved with the Child Protection System (CPS). Study 2 assessed the implementation fidelity and identified practitioners’ perceptions of modifications made and barriers and facilitators encountered throughout implementation. Study 3 was conducted five years after practitioners had completed the STP accreditation and assessed the extent to which the program was sustained over time and why. This study also explored the perspectives of practitioners, organizational managers, and system-level representatives of CPS on the characteristics of this system that may be influencing the sustained use of EBPPs. The findings of Studies 2 and 3 reinforced the importance of flexible delivery to address the multi-level factors that affect the implementation and sustained use of EBPPs in real-world settings. Study 4 aimed to examine whether families who completed STP were more likely to have their child protection case closed 12 months later than families who dropped out and whether program dosage predicted case closure. The results of this study supported the positive effect of program completion and dosage on CPS discharge. Overall, this research project contributes to the transfer of scientific knowledge to the field of evidence-based parenting intervention practice, particularly with families at psychosocial risk.