Prevention Programs for Young Rural Teens Can Reduce Methamphetamine Abuse Years Later
From EurekAlert! - Breaking News:
New research supported in part by the National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA), National Institutes of Health, shows that prevention programs conducted in middle school can reduce methamphetamine abuse among rural adolescents years later.
Because methamphetamine addiction leads to problems with social interactions and a wide range of medical conditions, research into early interventions such as this is critical to protecting the Nation's youth.
In the first study, 667 families of rural Iowa 6th-graders were randomly assigned to participate in one of two family-focused interventions, the Iowa Strengthening Families Project (ISFP) or the Preparing for the Drug Free Years (PDFY) program, or act as controls.
In the second study, 679 families of rural Iowa 7th-graders were randomly recruited for the Life Skills Training (LST) program (a school-based intervention) combined with the Strengthening Family Program for Parents and Youth (SFP 10-14, modified from the ISFP), the LST program only, or a minimal-contact control group.
A total of 588 families participated in the 11th-grade follow-up and 597 families participated in the 12th-grade follow-up.
In the first study, none of the ISFP 12th-graders had abused methamphetamine in the past year compared to 3.6 percent of the PDFY 12th-graders and 3.2 percent of the controls.
In the second study, the combined SFP 10-14 + LST intervention showed significant effects on both lifetime and past year methamphetamine abuse.
"While some of these results are very promising, further research needs to be done to investigate the applicability of these particular programs to nonrural populations, rural populations in other parts of the country, and populations with different ethnic compositions," says Dr. Spoth.
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