Merging Basic with Practical Research to Enhance the Adolescent Experience

Abstract

The biennial conferences on adolescent research were initiated to provide aforum where researchers and practitioners could exchange ideas, identify problems, and discuss viable solutions to those problems. This author's experience at the Fifth Biennial Conforwnce, held in March 1989 in Tucson, Arizona, culminated in a realization that the researcher-practitioner distinction has not been resolved. Researchers continue to research, practitioners continue to practice, and both groups function in relatively isolated environments. The inability and/or unwillingness to reduce the researchpractice gap, no doubt, has diluted the effectiveness ofpreventionlintervention programs which target adolescent problems, including suicide, homicide, violence and crime, substance use and abuse, pregnancy, and school dropout. This article summarizes much of the information shared at the Fifth Biennial Conference, and proposes that researchers and practitioners will need to join forces in order to protect adolescents from making choices that compromise their future.