Soler-i-Martí, Roger2024-09-252024-09-252015Soler-i-Martí R. Youth political involvement update: measuring the role of cause-oriented political interest in young people’s activism. J Youth Stud. 2015;18(3):396-416. DOI: 10.1080/13676261.2014.9635381367-6261http://hdl.handle.net/10230/61221In recent decades, a series of transformations have occurred that have changed young people's relationships with politics. In most Western countries, young people vote less and protest more. Survey research has detected this two-fold process in participation behaviour, but has failed to detect this same process in the field of political attitudes. In particular, the emergence of a specific dimension of psychological political involvement with a special impact on youth has gone unnoticed in survey-based research. Based on some recent qualitative studies, this research tries to identify and measure a specific dimension of interest in politics using a new question in a survey carried out in Catalonia in 2011. An interest directly oriented to political issues and causes – particularly those relevant in young people's everyday lives – is identified. The article also evaluates how traditional survey indicators of political involvement do capture, or not, this particular dimension of interest in politics. Finally, the new cause-oriented interest indicator is tested to analyse its impact on different types of participation in order to better understand patterns of activism in young people.application/pdfeng© This is an Accepted Manuscript of an article published by Taylor & Francis in Journal of Youth Studies on 2014 Oct 8, available online: http://www.tandfonline.com/10.1080/13676261.2014.963538.info:eu-repo/semantics/articlehttp://dx.doi.org/10.1080/13676261.2014.963538Political involvementYoung peopleInterest in politicsSurveyParticipationinfo:eu-repo/semantics/openAccess