Background

Sustainable democracies rest on broad and inclusive opportunities for civic engagement and participation. Civic engagement can be understood in practical terms as active participation in society, but it also encompasses e.g. individuals’ beliefs in their own capacity to influence matters, perceptions of the effectiveness of personal involvement, and motivation to engage (see e.g. Schulz et al., 2017). It therefore extends beyond participatory actions in formal politics, to include various forms of connections within civic life and across different communities, both in-person and online.

Among young people, civic engagement prior to adulthood may be reflected in participation in, for example, school activities, that mirror civic actions in adult life. However, civic engagement becomes also evident as personal interest and taking stances in contemporary societal issues or matters of importance to young people. It may likewise be expressed through efforts to influence society by participating in, for instance, environmental organizations—contributing to shaping civil society.

Therefore, civic engagement is a multidimensional concept, encompassing various forms, such as behavioural and cognitive engagement, with special functions (see Reeve et al., 2025). Furthermore,  higher levels of civic engagement are also positively linked to civic knowledge gained from formal school education. It has also been associated with enhanced well‑being and a stronger commitment to civic principles such as equality (Mužík et al., 2025). Correspondingly, a lack of engagement may accumulate at the individual level over time and develop into significant challenges to social belonging, as well as undermine the ability to participate meaningfully in fostering an equitable democratic society (Schulz et al., 2017). Therefore, fostering civic engagement among young people through school education is particularly vital, as students will ultimately become the adults responsible for shaping future societies.

In International Civic and Citizenship Study (ICCS) 2016, civic engagement was investigated in detail in 24 countries (Schulz et al., 2017). In ICCS studies, civic engagement of 14-year-old students is measured through indicators encompassing e.g. civic participation in school, but also with anticipated future civic actions as adults, due to participants’ young age (see e.g. Damiani et al., 2025). However, expected behaviour can serve as a predictor of future civic actions and reflects also the engagement to civic issues at young age. Nevertheless, separate scales representing different dimensions of engagement are typically applied separately in ICCS studies (e.g. Schulz, 2024), and civic engagement is rarely examined as a unified construct. Therefore, this study draws on the civic engagement item pool from ICCS framework to consider all relevant indicators collectively, aiming to identify the underlying dimensions of civic engagement and to determine which components may be redundant or strongly interrelated. The objective of this study is to develop a comprehensive measure of civic engagement to refine how its dimensions are operationalised within the current framework and within the broader field of civic and citizenship education.

Furthermore, civic engagement may vary across contexts, such as countries, and according to background characteristics. Therefore, it is essential to investigate the dimensions of civic engagement among young students using large-scale datasets grounded in a robust conceptual framework, and to examine how engagement differs across countries and demographic groups.

Aims

The study investigates the following research questions:

1. What types of civic engagement can be identified among young students in ICCS context?
2. Is civic engagement similar across different countries and genders according to ICCS 2016 results?

Methods Data were drawn from the ICCS 2016 study conducted in four Nordic countries—Denmark, Finland, Norway, and Sweden (n = 18 962). The total sample was randomly divided into two equal subsamples. The first subsample was used for Exploratory Factor Analysis (EFA) on the combined Nordic sample using a polychoric correlation matrix (ordinal data) with the psych package in R. In EFA, oblimin rotation was used with student weights, and demonstrated excellent sampling adequacy (KMO = 0.919), with item-level MSAs all exceeding 0.90, indicating strong factorability of the selected items from ICCS. Based on the Kaiser criterion (eigenvalues > 1), scree plot, with KMO ≥ .80 in parallel analysis, five distinct factors of civic engagement emerged in the rotated solution, indicating adequate sampling adequacy (Kaiser, 1974) and loadings ≥ .40 considered salient. Factors explained approximately 51% of the total variance. Reliability estimates were satisfactory across all latent constructs, with Cronbach’s alpha values ranging from 0.72 to 0.87 and McDonald’s omega values ranging from 0.75 to 0.86, indicating adequate internal consistency for each factor. This structure was confirmed with the second subsample in confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) for ordinal indicators using polychoric correlation matrix (ordinal indicators) and the DWLS estimator in lavaan package in R, using student weights. Fit indices from the refined model indicated CFI = 0.905, TLI = 0.894, SRMR = 0.089, and RMSEA = 0.063 (90% CI [0.062, 0.064]), supporting an interpretable five-factor structure consistent with the prior EFA solution providing acceptable overall model fit. Internal consistency was assessed with Cronbach’s alpha and McDonald’s omega (≥ .70 acceptable). Convergent validity was examined via Average Variance Extracted (AVE ≥ .50), while discriminant validity was assessed by comparing the square root of AVE for each latent factor with its inter-factor correlations, following Fornell and Larcker’s (1981) criteria.

Results The analysis identified five dimensions of youth civic engagement. Standardized factor loadings were statistically significant, ranging from approximately 0.50 to 0.90, indicating strong convergent relations between latent factors and their indicators in ICCS. The second‑order factor model also showed acceptable fit. The factors included youth conventional engagement (elaborated e.g. in Kahne et al., 2008) in school, captured everyday behavioural forms of participation. Expected conventional engagement (see Schulz et al., 2017) described duty-based institutional behaviours such as voting and seeking political information. Civic efficacy (e.g., Metzger et al., 2020) represented young people’s perceived ability and willingness to engage in argumentation and public issues. Communicative engagement (see Slavina, 2021) comprised discussions of civic and political matters both in‑person and online, referring to socially oriented non-institutional expression. Finally, expected political involvement (see Ekman et al., 2012) reflected a proactive orientation, combining institutional activities—such as joining a political party—with individual, influential modes of participation, including participating in online forums and issue‑based activism. Strong measurement invariance was supported across the Nordic countries and across genders. All four countries, as well as boys and girls, exhibited a similar five‑factor structure of civic engagement, indicating that the model’s configuration is stable. Conclusions Youth civic engagement is vital as young people shape future societies. The model includes not only participation but also civic self‑efficacy, perceived impact of one’s actions, and interest in societal issues (see e.g. Schulz et al., 2017), although some redundancy was observed among the original scales. The findings show that the proposed model is suitable and reliable for the Nordic countries and genders. Next steps include testing criterion validity with civic knowledge and extending comparisons beyond the Nordic context. Strengthening understanding of youth civic engagement can support more equitable participation and improve democratic education.

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