Current research indicates that younger Americans, driven by socioeconomic shifts and cultural trends prioritizing self-actualization, are increasingly disinclined toward traditional communal organizations. Yet a search for self-actualization may, in fact, lead religiously inclined young adults to traditional communal organizations, which are characterized by relatively strict organizational norms. To explore how such organizations respond to the tension between self-actualization and communal practices, this paper describes a multi-method study of an urban Jewish congregation that experienced a large influx of young adults. The paper demonstrates two related outcomes of the resultant tension: first, the strategic integration of self-expressive content into traditional organizational practices, in a manner that allows these practices to become vehicles for self-actualization; second, the leveraging of these young adults’ transience, in both formal and informal ways, in order to maintain organizational stability. These two seemingly paradoxical outcomes contribute to our understanding of how some communal organizations respond to young adults’ self-actualizing inclinations.

中文翻译：

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“年轻人想自己做”——​​自我实现、承诺与社区重塑

目前的研究表明，在社会经济变化和优先考虑自我实现的文化趋势的推动下，年轻的美国人越来越不喜欢传统的社区组织。然而，事实上，寻求自我实现可能会将有宗教倾向的年轻人带到传统的社区组织，这些组织的特点是相对严格的组织规范。为了探讨这些组织如何应对自我实现和社区实践之间的紧张关系，本文描述了一项对经历了大量年轻人涌入的城市犹太会众的多方法研究。本文展示了由此产生的张力的两个相关结果：首先，将自我表达内容战略性地整合到传统的组织实践中，以某种方式允许这些实践成为自我实现的工具；其次，以正式和非正式的方式利用这些年轻人的短暂性，以保持组织的稳定性。这两个看似矛盾的结果有助于我们理解一些社区组织如何回应年轻人的自我实现倾向。