PREVENTION RESEARCH

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PREVENTION RESEARCH
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Prevention Research

• Why study prevention research?
• Theories assist in identifying how we can
  prevent a problem behavior from occurring,
  taking the guesswork out of planning
• Why review the six CSAP strategies?
• To know and understand the CSAP comprehensive
  strategies and how they correlate with the
  Principles of Effectiveness
• To use as a tool to create a comprehensive
  prevention program

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What Should a Good Theory Do?

• Identify the factors that predict substance abuse
• Explain the mechanisms through which they operate
• Identify the internal and external variables that
  influence these mechanisms, including cultural
  factors

• Predict points to interrupt the course leading to
  substance abuse
• Specify the interventions to prevent onset of
  substance abuse

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Risk Protective Factors Theory

• Risk factors predict substance abuse and
  protective factors can buffer risk factors
• Risk and protective factors have cumulative
  effect
• Risk and protective factors occur in communities,
  families, schools, and individuals and are
  subject to change

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Risk Protective Factors Theory

• To prevent substance abuse, reduce risk factors
  and increase protective factors throughout a
  childs life
• Risk and protective factors can be influenced by
  individual, family, school, and environmental
  change strategies.

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Risk and Protective Factors

• Risk factors are conditions for a group,
  individual, or defined geographic area that
  increase the likelihood of a substance use/abuse
  or other problems occurring

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Risk and Protective Factors

• Protective factors are conditions that build
  resilience to substance abuse and other problems
  and can serve to buffer the negative effects of
  risk

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Prevention Theory Risk Protection Focused
Prevention

• There is a link between risk and protective
  factors and youth behavior. Youth high in risk or
  low in protection are more likely to engage in
  problem behaviors.
• Risk and protective factors predict future youth
  behaviors both positive and problem behaviors

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Risk Protective Factors Theory

• Similar to public health model of disease
  prevention- decrease risk and increase protection
• The prevention of heart disease is an example of
  risk and protection focused prevention.

Protection includes
Risks include

• Smoking
• High fat diet
• High cholesterol

• Exercise
• Diet high in fruits and vegetables

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Risk Protective Factors Theory

• Different adolescent health and behavior problems
  share common risk factors
• Substance abuse
• Violence
• Delinquency
• School drop out
• Teen pregnancy

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Criteria for Inclusion as a Risk Factor

• Multiple studies
• Longitudinal
• Predictive

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Community Risk Factors

• Availability of drugs
• Community laws and norms favorable toward drug
  use
• Transitions and mobility
• Low neighborhood attachment and community
  disorganization
• Extreme economic deprivation

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Family Risk Factors

• Family history of substance abuse
• Family management problems
• Family conflict
• Parental attitudes and involvement in drug use

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School Risk Factors

• Academic failure beginning in elementary school
• Lack of commitment to school

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School Risk Factors

• Academic failure beginning in late elementary
  grades (4-6), academic failure increases the risk
  of both drug use and delinquency
• Lack of commitment to school Surveys of high
  school seniors have shown that substance use is
  significantly lower among those who expect to
  attend college than among those who do not.
  Factors such as liking school, spending time on
  homework, and perceiving their coursework as
  relevant are also negatively related to drug use.

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Individual/Peer Risk Factors

• Early and persistent antisocial behavior
• Alienation / rebelliousness
• Friends who use drugs
• Gang involvement
• Favorable attitudes toward drugs
• Early initiation of drug use
• Constitutional factors

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Protective Factors

• Individual characteristics
• Bonding
• Healthy beliefs and clear standards

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School Protective Factors

• Opportunities for positive involvement When
  young people are given more opportunities to
  participate meaningfully in important school
  activities, they are less likely to engage in
  problem behavior
• Rewards for Conventional Involvement When young
  people are recognized and rewarded for their
  contributions to school, they are less likely to
  be involved in substance abuse and other problem
  behaviors

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The Social Development Strategy
Healthy Behaviors
Healthy Beliefs Clear Standards

• Bonding
• Attachment
• Commitment

Opportunities
Recognition
Skills
Individual Characteristics
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Developmental AssetsFramework

• Emphasizes strengths in people
• Focuses on youth as resources, not problems
• Focuses on increasing the number of assets
  present in youths lives
• Is a promising framework

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Resiliency Approach

• Focuses on how children bounce back in the
  face of adversity
• Based largely on the work of Emmy Werner
• Includes several factors which foster resilience
  in kids
• Is a promising approach

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Case Studies on Theories

• Select a facilitator, a timekeeper, and a
  recorder.
• Read the case study assigned to your group.
• Determine which risk factors and protective
  factors are at work in your case.
• Report back to whole group.

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Case Studies on Theories

• Is there consensus on which risk factors were
  identified?
• Is there consensus on which protective factors
  were identified?
• How might our values and culture influence which
  factors we see present?

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Caution!

• Purpose of this case study activity
• To begin using the risk factor and protective
  factor language
• To see what risk and protective factors might
  look like in a community
• Risk and Protective Factors are identified in
  communities using a formal assessment
• Section 3 presents a process for assessing the
  levels of risk and protective factors in
  communities
• Data collection and analysis drives the process

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Six Prevention StrategiesCenter for Substance
Abuse Prevention (CSAP)

• Information Dissemination
• Prevention Education
• Alternative Activities
• Community-Based Processes
• Environmental Approaches
• Problem Identification and Referral

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Information Dissemination

• Complementary to other prevention approaches
• Appeal to youths motives for using substances or
  perceptions of substance use
• Television and radio spots in choice air times
• Avoid the use of authority figures

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Prevention Education

• Interactive approaches engaging the target
  audience are more effective
• Peer-led or include peer-led components
• Academic year or longer and involve booster
  sessions
• Two sets of workshops that work to improve parent
  skills along with adolescent skills

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Alternatives

• Part of a comprehensive prevention plan
• High-risk youth who may not have adequate adult
  supervision can benefit
• Example Community service
• One-shot community events do not, in themselves,
  change the behavior of participants

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Community-based Processes

• Characteristics of successful partnerships
  include
• a clear vision
• committed partnership members
• diverse participants
• Paid coalition staff operate as resource
  providers and facilitators
• Elaborate committee structures are not
  productive

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Environmental

• Examples include
• Excise taxes
• Enforcement of minimum purchase age laws
• Use and lose laws. Penalties should not be too
  harsh.
• Increasing the minimum purchase age for alcohol
• Outlet density

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Problem Identification and Referral

• Provide accurate estimates
• Be careful of labeling
• Example Student Assistance teams
• Other forms of community intervention for
  identification and referral

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A Comprehensive Approach

• Information dissemination Newsletter for
  parents/ all school assembly
• Prevention Education Classroom lessons, booster
  sessions, integration into school improvement
  activities
• Alternatives Reinforcement of skills in
  afterschool program

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A Comprehensive Approach

• Community-based process School- Community
  leadership team and all school involvement
• Environmental Strategies Schoolwide
  expectations, common area expectations, system of
  consequences
• Problem Identification/Referral Individual
  intervention system

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Enhancing Prevention Programs

• Directions
• Think of a familiar prevention program.
• Which CSAP strategy is it?
• Find that strategy in the work sheet, Research
  Findings and CSAP Strategies
• Based on the findings presented, make 1 or 2
  recommendations to strengthen your program
• Prepare to share with the group.

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Effective Prevention Programming NIDA Principles

• Principles for School-based programs
• Do the school-based programs reach children from
  kindergarten through high school? If not, do they
  at least reach children during the critical
  middle school or junior school years?
• Do the programs contain multiple years of
  intervention?
• Do the programs use a well-tested, standardized
  intervention with detailed lesson plans and
  student material?

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Effective Prevention Programming NIDA Principles
Principles for School-based programs

• Do the programs teach resistance skills through
  interactive methods (modeling, role-playing,
  discussion, group feedback, reinforcement)

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Effective Prevention Programming NIDA Principles
Principles for School-based programs

• Do the programs foster prosocial bonding to the
  school and community?

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Effective Prevention Programming NIDA Principles
Principles for School-based programs

• Do the programs
• teach social competency (community,
  self-efficacy, assertiveness) and resistance
  skills that are culturally and developmentally
  appropriate
• promote positive peer influence
• promote anti-drug social norms
• include adequate number of sessions

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NIDA - What Works Substance Abuse Prevention
Key elements of effective substance abuse
programs include

• Help students recognize internal and external
  pressures that influence them to use ATOD
• Develop personal, social, and refusal skills to
  resist these pressures
• Teach that using ATOD is not the norm even if
  students think everyone is doing it

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NIDA - What Works Substance Abuse Prevention
Key elements of effective substance abuse
programs include

• Provide developmentally appropriate material and
  activities
• Use interactive teaching techniques
• Actively involve the family and community
• Include teacher training and support contain
  material that is easy for teachers to implement
  and culturally relevant for students

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Prevention Research

• Why study prevention research?
• Theories assist in identifying how we can
  prevent a problem behavior from occurring,
  taking the guesswork out of planning.
• Why review the six CSAP strategies?
• To know what strategies are when encountered in
  grant applications, etc.
• To use as a tool to create a comprehensive
  prevention program.

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QUESTIONS DISCUSSION