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Development and Effects of Transformational Leadership in Adolescents

March 29, 2002 

"Despite ever increasing attention being paid to transformational leadership in the literature and its wide theoretical (Bass, 1997, 1998) and practical acceptance (Avolio, 1998), the development of transformational leadership behaviors has rarely been examined and remains little understood.  Transformational leadership compromises four components, namely, idealized influence, inspirational motivation, intellectual stimulation, and individualized consideration.

Most of the research conducted on leadership in general, and transformational leadership in particular, has focused on its measurement (e.g., Bycio, Hackett, & Allen, 1995) and/or on its effects.  Some studies have identified factors that predispose individuals to choose to use transformational leadership, such as postconventional moral reasoning (Turner & Barling, 1998) or emotional intelligence (Slater, Barling, & Kelloway, 1998).  The effects of parents and the home environment on leadership development have also been addressed (Karnes & D'Ilio, 1989), but the developmental origins of leadership remain elusive.  Consequently, the aim of this study is to further our understanding of the development of leadership in children, and transformational leadership in particular.

To provide multiple ratings of transformational leadership, this study involved not only the adolescent participants, but also several of their peers and their coaches.  The participants in this study were members of 13 Canadian high school sports teams and their coaches, representing basketball, volleyball, badminton, touch football, and rugby.  Of these teams, eight were all female (representing all five sports), three were all male (basketball, rugby, and volleyball), and two had both female and male members (track and field).  From these teams 120 students and 12 team coaches agreed to participate.  A complete data set consisted of a student questionnaire assessing their perceptions of ther mothers' and fathers' child-rearing behaviors, self-perceptions of their own transformational leadership behaviors, one to five peer evaluations of the student in questions, and a coach evaluation of the same students.  After the elimination of students with incomplete data sets, 112 participants remained (57%).  Of these students, 87 were female and 25 were male.  The mean age of students' participants was 15.19 years.  Participants had played on their respective teams for an average of 2.33 seasons.  Of the 12 team coaches participating in this study, nine were high school teachers and three were university student volunteers.  On average, coaches had instructed each player for 2.17 seasons.

In all assessments of transformational leadership, we used a global scale rather than assessing the individual components because of substantial correlations between the individual components in the current study and in previous studies (e.g., Bycio et al., 1995; Carless, 1998).

Students' perceptions of parental transformational leadership were measured using 12 items selected from the Multifactor Leadership Questionnaire (MLQ) Form 5X (Bass & Avolio, 1996).  Students completed the questionnaire separately for perceptions of their mothers' and fathers' behaviors.  Following Bass and Avolio (1995), the standard response scale was used throughout.  Thus, responses were on a 5-point Likert type scale.

Students' evaluations of their own and their teammates' transformational leadership were in both cases, assessed using 12 items selected from the MLQ (Bass & Avolio, 1995).  Coach evaluations of student transformational leadership was measured with a similar 12-item version of the MLQ (Bass & Avolio, 1995), but were reworded slightly to reflect the team sports context.  Peer evaluations of the outcome variables, namely, satisfaction with leader, perceptions of leader effectiveness, and effort expended were assessed using eight additional MLQ items developed by Bass and Avolio (1995).  Coaches perceptions of adolescents' leadership effectiveness, effort-enhancing skills, and peers' satisfaction with leadership were assessed using the same 8-item measure of the outcome variables assessing satisfaction with leader, general leader effectiveness, and effort expended by followers.  Coach evaluations of athletic skill were assessed with two questions.  The first, 'How would you rate this player in terms of his/her athletic ability?' was answered on a 10-point Likert-type scale.  The second, 'How critical is this player to the overall performance of the team?' was answered on a 10-point Likert-type scale.

The purpose of this study was to examine the development and effects of adolescents' transformational leadership behaviors.  The model as a whole was strongly supported by the data.  The results of this study extend previous research in the area of leadership development.  First, this study demonstrates that leadership development can be explained in a social learning framework (Bandura, 1977).  Specifically, adolescents perceive the extent to which their fathers use behaviors consistent with transformational leadership when interacting with them and, in turn manifest these behaviors themselves when interacting with their peers.  Second the current results demonstrate that transformational leadership behaviors are not only manifested by adults, but by adolescents as well. 

In conclusion, the findings from this study advance our understanding of leadership development in adolescents, as well as transformational leadership.  These results indicate that the extent to which parents interact with their adolescents in a transformational manner affects the degree to which the adolescents themselves adopt these behaviors.  These findings also show that those adolescents who display transformational leadership behaviors influence their peers, thereby extending our understanding of transformational leadership (Zacharatos, Barling, & Kelloway, 2000, pp. 211-226)."

Reference:  Zacharatos, A.; Barling, J.; & Kelloway, E.K.; (2000).  Development and effects of transformational leadership in adolescents.  The Leadership Quarterly, 11(2).

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Created: 2008-02-25, Updated: 2009-02-17