The Role of Curiosity in the Sociopolitical Development of Black and Latinx Adolescents.

Sociopolitical development, the process of coming to understand and take action against systems of oppression, is associated with key outcomes for youth. Although rooted in Paulo Freire's work on critical consciousness, sociopolitical development models overlook a motivational attribute-curiosity-that Freire characterized as a catalyst of such development. This longitudinal study investigated the relationship between curiosity and two aspects of sociopolitical development (social analysis, societal involvement) in a sample of Black and Latinx adolescents (N = 659). Longitudinal growth models demonstrated positive growth in all constructs over 4-years of high school. Multivariate growth models revealed a positive correlation at baseline between curiosity and both constructs; growth in curiosity was also positively correlated with growth in social analysis and societal involvement.