The importance of bonding to school for healthy development: Findings from the social development research group

Development Project'- ^ and Raising Healthy Children.' " The theoretical importance of school connectedness, empirical support for the theoretical propositions of the impact of school connectedness on a variety of problem and positive behaviors, and the impact of interventions to improve school connectedness as a mechanism to improve outcomes for children and adolescents are described. This paper uses a defmition of school connectedness and school bonding, derived from control theory ' and revised by investigations of the concept. The term used for school connectedness, school bonding, consists of two primary and interdependent components: 1) attachment, characterized by close affective relationships with those at school; and 2) commitment, characterized by an investment in school and doing well in school