The purpose of this research is to design, develop, and evaluate the impacts of a videotape program for family/home use focused on instructing parents and adolescents about the cause and prevention of AIDS and other sexually transmitted diseases (STDs); teaching parents and adolescents (in ways that are acceptable to them) how to frequently discuss AIDS, STDs, sexual behavior, and safer sexual practices (including abstinence); and training adolescents how to effectively deal with high-risk social, sexual, and drug-related situations. The overall approach is seen as one way to reduce some of the divisiveness caused by other approaches (e.g., school-based programs), while perhaps enhancing family harmony. The research is guided by psychological and communication theory and principles, an information and behavior framework, and a process of change model, all of which have been tested out in prior and ongoing media-behavior change research. The major procedures of behavior change used in the videotape program will be behavioral modeling, successive approximation, and feedback and goal setting, procedures which have been central to the investigator's research. The content for the video program and successive tests of its effectiveness will be developed through formative research, prototype, and pilot research phases of this project. The video program will be designed in such a way that parents and adolescents can choose a level of content with a degree of explicitness and types of modeling segments that fit the family's values and lifestyle. Segments within the program will allow for practice (role plays) and feedback with specific goals. Other segments following a minimally interactive approach will allow for training for appropriate responses in high-risk situations. The programs follows a skill training/problem solving approach, and more generally, methods found effective in other areas of adolescent health behavior change. The video program will be directed toward families with adolescents aged 12 to 14, because of an increase in sexual activity by 15 to 16 years old, and because of developmental considerations. Within experimental field studies (with such families), fine-grain measures, also based on prior and ongoing research, will track not only cognitive changes, but parent-child discussions of AIDS, STDs, and sexual behavior and adolescent performance in high-risk situations. Additional parent and adolescent measures are based on a process of change model. In this way, it will be possible to develop and effective program which is acceptable to parents and adolescents, as well as more generally understanding processes related to behavior change. Finally, a larger scale experimental field study will assess the efficacy of different distribution channels for the video program. The approach and investigation is considered within the context of national efforts for the prevention of AIDS, other adolescent health issues, and adolescent health behavior change, and different modalities for promoting health behavior changes.
| Winett, R A; Anderson, E S; Moore, J F et al. (1993) Efficacy of a home-based human immunodeficiency virus prevention video program for teens and parents. Health Educ Q 20:555-67 |
| Winett, R A; Anderson, E S; Moore, J F et al. (1992) Family/media approach to HIV prevention: results with a home-based, parent-teen video program. Health Psychol 11:203-6 |
