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For some youth, thinking about the future -- let alone expressing aspirations for the future -- is a daunting task. This incapacity to aspire is problematic in itself, but particularly as neoliberal societies widely expect young people from adolescence onwards to "have a plan" for their own future. In our research among disadvantaged youth in Europe, we observed such dreamless predicaments countless times, prompting us to wonder: how and when do aspirations emerge? Why do they flourish or wither away over time? Why do youth from similar backgrounds, facing comparable levels of adversity, relate so differently to their future potential? Although the "capacity to aspire" is largely conditioned by one's social, economic and cultural background, it is not a given: its development depends on how individual life trajectories and the accumulated experience of social interactions become resources to explore the future in a productive way. Examining the micro-sociological processes through which the capacity to aspire unfolds is critical for understanding how young people learn to aspire and act on their aspirations in the long run. Building on insights from Appadurai, Bourdieu and research in continental Europe, this article proposes a conceptual framework for understanding how aspirations develop and wither.

This article approaches the mystery of preference formation – a blind spot in the capability approach – from the angle of aspiring. I argue that aspiring – actively engaging with desirable representations of potential futures – can be helpful to analyse the social processes involved in preference formation under two conditions. Firstly, we need to clarify the conceptual confusion around aspiring that can be found in the capability literature and beyond. Secondly, we need to consider the social and temporal embeddedness of aspiring, which can be done by examining the relationships between aspiring and people's lived experiences. Building on a critical discussion of the contribution of sociologists Alfred Schutz and Pierre Bourdieu to the study of projecting, I propose a framework to (a) analyse why aspiring may happen to lead to conceiving conservative aspirations despite adversity – thereby aligning with adaptive preferences in the sense of Sen, A. 2002. Rationality and Freedom. Cambridge, MA and London: The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press and Elster, J. 1983. Sour Grapes: Studies in the Subversion of Rationality. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press – and to (b) envision the pathways along which aspiring could, alternatively, lead to emergent aspirations, i.e. geared at enhanced well-being. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Summary: Engaging youth in obesity prevention research and policy action is essential to develop strategies that are relevant and sensitive to their needs. Research with young people requires critical reflection to safeguard their rights, dignity, and well‐being. The CO‐CREATE project used various methods to engage approximately 300 European youth aged 15–19 years in the development of policies to prevent adolescent obesity. This paper discusses ethical considerations made in the project pertaining to the youth's voluntary participation, their protection from obesity stigma, respect for their time, data privacy and confidentiality, power balance, and equality of opportunity to participate in the research. We describe measures implemented to prevent or limit the emergence of ethical challenges in our interaction with youth and discuss their relevance based on our experience with implementation. While some challenges seemingly were prevented, others arose related to the youth's voluntary participation, time burdens on them, and the sustainability of participation under the Covid‐19 pandemic. Concrete and ongoing ethical guidance may be useful in projects aiming to interact and build collaborative relationships with youth for long periods of time. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]