The purpose of this competing continuation proposal is to extend a program of research that began in September, 1991 and has included (a) a controlled pilot phase efficacy study of the Preparing for the Drug Free Years (PDFY) intervention, (b) several consumer-oriented studies of factors influencing participation in family skills interventions like the PDFY, and (c) five waves of data collection in a prevention trial. The longitudinal prevention trial includes the PDFY, a second more intensive universal intervention (the Iowa Strengthening Families Program), and a control condition.
The first aim of this proposal is to collect another wave of prevention trial follow-up data, in order to examine long-term outcomes of the interventions.
The second aim i s to model processes influencing intervention outcomes, including models of mechanisms of intervention-related change in parent and child outcomes proximally and distally targeted by the interventions.
These aims will be achieved through senior-year follow-up data collection, along with analyses of this and prior waves of data from the ongoing prevention trial. This trial began with the random assignment of 33 rural schools having a sixth grade and meeting the criteria for the federal school lunch program. Multi- informant, multimethod measurement procedures at pretesting involved 667 families from the 33 schools. Retention rates have been very comparable to those reported in reviews of longitudinal preventive intervention studies. Pilot phase and trial phase analyses to date, including multilevel analysis (mixed model ANCOVA, hierarchical linear modeling) and latent growth curve modeling, have shown (a) significant, positive effects of the interventions on effective parenting, child competencies, and child substance use; (b) support for models of family participation factors; and (c) support for models of intervention-related mechanisms of change in family processes. Comparisons of intervention-control differences on child substance use outcomes will be conducted at the senior-year data collection point via multilevel and latent growth curve analyses. Planned modeling of intervention-related change mechanisms will include multisample structural equation and latent growth curve models of interrelationships among targeted parenting and child outcomes.
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