The long-term objective of this 4-year prison based study is to reduce the high-risk behaviors that lead to the development of AIDS in women who have a risk and/or history of drug use. The study will be done at the Baltimore City Detention Center (BCDC) using AIDS prevention and education strategies, empowering techniques, strategies and skills that promote personal control, increase self-esteem, reduce high-risk sexual and drug using behaviors, and improve ability to communicate with others. The following specific aims are addressed: 1) to promote changes in behaviors (safer sex practices and drug using behaviors) that are consistent with strategies for AIDS prevention in women incarcerated in the BCDC, using peer Counseling and leadership training, 2) to increase self-esteem and AIDS knowledge in order to promote recognition and adoption of alternative behaviors that are consistent with existing beliefs and values, 3) to educate incarcerated participants to be role models and change agents by teaching them how to educate others regarding AIDS and the prevention of the spread of AIDS, 4) to stimulate assumption of catalytic roles by the participants (after release) for the purpose of reducing risk behaviors associated with AIDS in their primary networks and communities, and 5) to use peer co-leaders to maintain contact with the women participants after they are released from prison. In this experimental design, high-risk sexual and drug behavior, self- esteem, and promotion of AIDS prevention of incarcerated women will be measured before and just after treatment and at 2 weeks, 3 months, and 6 months post-release from the (BCDC). The questionnaires will include a demographic questionnaire; the Rosenberg's 10-item Guttman scale to measure general social psychological attitudes toward self; a psychometrically tested sexual and drug behaviors questionnaire; an individual and community HIV/AlDS activity checklist; an AIDS knowledge questionnaire; an attitudinal scale, and the Marlowe-Crowne social desirability questionnaire that measures need for approval of others. The study will include an 8-session peer counseling and leadership training program (PCLT) for women incarcerated in the (BCDC). Volunteers will be randomly assigned into treatment and control groups co-led by a professional and a peer co-leader. A sample size of 300 participants is projected. The primary analytic approach will be repeated measures analyses of covariance to compare differences between the two groups with respect to changes in high-risk sexual behavior, drug use, self-esteem, and AIDS knowledge.
| Harris, R M; Dennis, K E (1997) Where reality meets methodology in conducting nursing intervention research with women. Nurs Res 46:240-3 |
