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Haggerty, Kevin; Kosterman, Rick; Catalano, Richard F.;Hawkins, J. DavidPreparing for the Drug Free Years. Juvenile JusticeBulletin.Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquent Prevention (Dept.of Justice), Washington, DC.National Inst. on Drug Abuse (DHHS/PHS), Rockville, MD.NCJ-1734081999-07-0013p.

DA-070-29-01A1Juvenile Justice Clearinghouse; PublicationReprint/Feedback, P.O. Box 6000, Rockville, MD 20849-6000;Tel.: 800-638-8736 (Toll Free); Fax: 301-519-5212; e-mail:askncjrs@ncjrs.orgReports Descriptive (141)MF01/PC01 Plus Postage.Alcohol Abuse; Behavior Problems; Curriculum Research;*Delinquency Prevention; Drug Abuse; *Early Adolescents;*Family Programs; Family Relationship; Intermediate Grades;*Parent Child Relationship; *Parenting Skills; SocialProblems; ViolenceJuvenile Justice Delinquency Prevention Office

Preparing for the Drug Free Years (PDFY) is a familyintervention program that seeks to help parents avoid specific parentingpractices that increase the risk for adolescent problem behaviors and toincrease practices that are likely to enhance family communication andbonding. The PDFY curriculum is designed for universal application and hasbeen used and adapted with a broad range of various socioeconomic andcultural backgrounds while targeting parents of children in grades fourthrough seven. This issue of the Bulletin provides an overview of the PDFYparenting program and summarizes the results of studies of the program. Thestudies provide evidence that the PDFY program is appropriate for general anddiverse populations and that it can be successfully disseminated. Thesestudies also show that PDFY improves parenting practices in ways that reducerisk factors and enhance protective factors for adolescent problem behaviors.(Contains 15 references and 5 annotated web sites.) (GCP)

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D9

U.S. Department of Justice

Office of Justice Programs

Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention

U.S. DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATIONOffice of Educational Research and Improvement

EDUCATIONAL RESOURCES INFORMATIONCENTER (ERIC)

0 This document has been reproduced a8received from the person or organizationoriginating it.

0 Minor changes have been made to improvereproduction quality.

Points of view or opinions stated in this dot u-ment do not necessarily represent officialOERI position or policy.

c17 W K1 0 11-, C11_) Lu3 0@i VIII LLJJ o5:9

Preparing for theDrug Free Years

Stvength

"c i d"0)

.d0

Kevin Haggerty, Rick Kosterman, Richard F. Catalano,and J. David Hawkins

The Office of Juvenile Justice and Delin-quency Prevention (OJJDP) is dedicated topreventing and reversing trends of increaseddelinquency and violence among adoles-cents. These trends have alarmed the publicand challenged the juvenile justice system. Itis widely accepted that increases in delin-quency and violence over the past decadeare rooted in a number of interrelated socialproblemschild abuse and neglect, alcoholand drug abuse, youth conflict and aggres-sion, and early sexual involvementthatmay originate within the family structure.The focus of OJJDP's Family StrengtheningSeries is to provide assistance to ongoingefforts across the country to strengthen thefamily unit by discussing the effectiveness offamily intervention programs and providingresources to families and communities.

Parents can play powerful, proactiveroles in guiding child development. Studieshave shown that parents can be taught touse consistent and skillful parenting prac-tices, which are key to proactive familymanagement. Effective parent training hasbeen shown to help parents avoid specificparenting practices that increase the riskfor adolescent problem behaviors and toincrease practices that are likely to en-hance family communication and bonding.Preparing for the Drug Free Years (PDFY)is one such program. The flexible PDFYcurriculum, which is designed for universal

application and has been used and adaptedwith a broad range of families of varioussocioeconomic and cultural backgrounds,targets parents of children in grades fourthrough seven. It is designed to effectivelyreach adult learners regardless of learningstyle or level of education.

This Bulletin provides an overview ofthe PDFY parenting program and summa-rizes results of studies of the program. Theresearch presented here is unique. Fewstudies with strong research designs haveexamined the effectiveness of parent train-ing offered as a universal preventive inter-vention.

The goal of PDFY is to empower parentsof children ages 8 to 14 to reduce the risksthat their children will abuse drugs andalcohol or develop other common adoles-cent problems. PDFY teaches parents howto reduce critical risk factors and enhanceprotective factors that are especially im-portant during the late elementary andmiddle school years.

History of theProgram

PDFY grew out of a desire to teach par-ents the skills they need to prevent drugabuse in their families. This was particu-larly important during the mid-1980's as

2

From the AdministratorIn the mid-1980's, rates of youth druguse were increasing across America.The Preparing for the Drug FreeYears program was created to equipparents with skills that they could useto prevent their 8- to 14-year-oldchildren from becoming involvedwith drugs.

This Bulletin describes the program'shistory from its introduction in thepublic schools of Seattle, WA, in1987 to the present. The programhas been implemented in more than30 States and Canada and hastrained more than 120,000 families.

Drawing on research conducted byDrs. David Hawkins and RichardCatalano, the program targets riskfactors for juvenile substance abusesuch as inadequate parental supervi-sion, poor parent-child communica-tion, ill-defined expectations forchildren's behavior, family conflict,favorable attitudes toward youthalcohol and drug use by parents orsiblings, and parental alcoholism ordrug use.

Reducing such risk factors andmaximizing protective factors in thefamily setting are crucial to counter-acting negative peer influences thatcould expose children to the risks ofdrug use. The Preparing for the DrugFree Years program offers schoolsand communities a promisingapproach for achieving those ends.

Shay BilchikAdministrator

BESTCOPYAVAILABLE

rates of youth drug use and abuse in-creased throughout the Nation. The goalwas to develop a program that could beused by a large number of parents to re-duce family risk factors, enhance familyprotective factors, and employ parentingskills that would reduce children's healthrisks. The PDFY curriculum was devel-oped with these goals, field tested inSeattle, WA, schools, and then developedinto a video-assisted program for widerdistribution in 1987.

The curriculum was field tested for2 years in 10 Seattle public schools. In theseschools, 52 percent of the students werepeople of color, 48 percent were from low-income families (based on eligibility for aFederal free lunch program), and 39 percentwere from single-parent families. In additionto the public school field tests, the curricu-lum has been tested as part of a regionalbroadcast media program, in different state-wide implementations, within a healthmaintenance organization, and in a projectfocusing on families of color. Since its intro-duction in 1987, PDFY has been imple-mented in more than 30 States and inCanada. The program has trained morethan 120,000 families (see table 1).

Empirical BasePreventive efforts aimed at delin-

quency and drug abuse that are based onmodels of adolescent problem behaviorsthat are inconsistent with empirical evi-dence often fail. Recent research hasidentified some of the potential causes ofadolescent problem behaviors, includingdrug abuse, delinquency, violence, drop-ping out of school, and teenage preg-nancy (Brewer et al., 1995; Hawkins,Arthur, and Catalano, 1995; Resnick et al.,1997). These studies have helped tousher in a new era of prevention fo-cused on risk factors and protectivefactors. Interventions at any level, fromthe individual to the community, cannow be designed to address known pre-dictors of adolescent problem behav-iors that have been identified in theempirical literature.

A critically important feature ofPDFY is the research base on which itwas developed. Drs. David Hawkins andRichard Catalano, researchers in thefield of prevention of risk behavior atthe University of Washington, con-ducted a comprehensive review of the

Table 1: History of Preparing for the Drug Free Years

1984

1987

Began as part of a comprehensive school-based drug abuseprevention program.Developed into market-ready product by Developmental Researchand Programs as part of the KINGTV (Seattle's NBC affiliate station)dissemination program.

1990-94 Tested dissemination in several States and in ethnic minoritycommunities.

1991-97 Tested efficacy in Iowa with Project Family.

3

literature on risk and protective factorsand used their research as the empiricalcornerstone of the PDFY curriculum(Hawkins, Catalano, and Miller, 1992).Important risk factors include:

Little parental supervision andmonitoring.Low degree of communication andinteraction between parents andchildren.Poorly defined and poorly communi-cated rules and expectations forchildren's behavior.Inconsistent and excessively severediscipline.Other family risk factors for substance

abuse include:Family conflict.

Favorable parental attitudes towardteen alcohol and drug use.Favorable sibling attitudes towardalcohol and drug use.Parental alcoholism or drug use.Parents' expectations regarding their

children's drug use or friendship choicesmay be particularly important becauseparents often influence their children'searly first use of drugs and their choice offriends who use alcohol or other drugs.

Conversely, families can provide thefollowing protective factors against thedevelopment of health and behaviorproblems in children:

Parental support for child competencies.

Parental warmth and affection.Parental presentation of healthy be-liefs and clear standards for behavior.Enhancing protective factors in the

family environment is particularly impor-tant as children enter the middle schoolyears and move into early adolescence.During this period, the growing influenceof peers and the transition from elemen-tary to middle school environments in-crease children's exposure to a variety ofrisks.

Theoretical BaseThe PDFY curriculum is guided theoreti-

cally by the social development model,which emphasizes the role of bonding tofamily, school, and peers in healthy adoles-cent development. The model specifiesthat strong bonding to positive influencesreduces the probability of delinquency andother problem behaviors. Bonding to the

2

family, according to the model, involvesthree critical factors:

The extent to which positive opportu-nities for involvement in the familyare available to the child.The skills with which the child partici-pates in the family to complete tasks,solve problems, and interact withothers.The rewards and punishments pro-vided by parents for behaviors thatconform to or violate the family ex-pectations and beliefs.Guided by this social development

model, PDFY seeks to reduce adolescentdrug abuse and behavioral problems by:

Increasing opportunities for involve-ment and interaction between parentsand children.

Teaching parents and children skills tohelp them resist peer pressure andrefuse to engage in inappropriatebehavior.

Increasing rewards for prosocial be-havior through parents' consistentand contingent family management.Managing and reducing family conflict.

The ProgramCurriculum

The curriculum is usually offered in afive-session 2-hour format. However, theprogram is flexible and has been adaptedto a 10-session 1-hour format to accommo-date delivery of PDFY in the workplace dur-ing the lunch hour. Some workshop leadershave spread the curriculum across morethan five 2-hour sessions to accommodateadditional parent discussion and practice

4wallaist

of skills taught by the curriculum. Forexample, one group began each set ofworkshops with a potluck dinner forparents, provided half of the content ofthe first session, and expanded the numberof sessions to six. The curriculum'scontent is described below.

Session 1, "Getting Started: How toPrevent Drug Abuse in Your Family," pro-vides an overview of the PDFY programand of risk factors for substance abuseincluding family management problems,family drug use and positive attitudestoward use, alienation and rebelliousness,friends who use drugs, and early first useof drugs or alcohol. Parents learn aboutthe nature and extent of drug use andabuse among teens. Participants learn howfamily bonding combined with healthybeliefs and clear standards can protectchildren from developing health andbehavior problems. Parents learn howthey can strengthen bonds by providingchildren opportunities, skills, andreinforcement or rewards for positivefamily involvement. In this session,parents practice the steps for con-ducting a family meeting to plan a jointrecreational activity as one mechanismfor increasing opportunities forrewarding involvement in the family.

Session 2, "Setting Clear FamilyExpectations on Drugs and Alcohol,"focuses on reducing such risk factorsas poor family management, favorableattitudes toward substance use, andearly first use of drugs or alcohol.This session teaches parents howto establish healthy beliefs and clearstandards for behavior, involve theirchildren in creating a family policy aboutalcohol and other drugs, use familymeetings, and recognize their children's

role in developing a family position ondrugs. The session begins with parentsidentifying their hopes and dreams fortheir children and how these hopes anddreams are jeopardized by drug use.Parents then learn to clarify their ownexpectations on alcohol and other druguse. They learn how to develop familyguidelines and monitoring strategies andhow to establish clear consequences forfollowing or breaking the stated familyrules on alcohol and other drug use. Finally,parents practice introducing a familyposition and involving their children indiscussing and developing the familyposition during a family meeting.

Session 3, "Avoiding Trouble," focuses onrisk factors including friends who use drugs,antisocial behavior in early adolescence,and early first use of alcohol or other drugs.Children attend this session with theirparents. Together they learn to resist peerpressure to use drugs or alcohol or engagein antisocial behavior, using the five steps ofRefusal Skills".' The five steps include:

Ask questions.

Name the trouble.Identify the consequences.Suggest an alternative.

Move it, sell it, and leave the dooropen (move away from the situation,sell the alternative to your friend, andleave the door open for later).Each skill is taught using the cognitive

behavioral techniques of introduction,discussion, role-play, and feedback. Fur-ther, parents and their children practiceusing refusal skills under pressure fromfriends. While one person applies thepressure of a negative influence in a role-play situation, the other practices usingrefusal skills under pressure. The stepsfor resisting pressure include:

Stay calm.

Say the person's name and makeeye contact.

Say, "Listen to me."

Pause.

Continue using the steps for Refusal

Parents and children also role-play Re-fusal SkillsTM under pressure when a groupplays the role of the negative influence.

' Refusal Skills" is a registered trademark of and thefive-step model copyrighted by Roberts Fitzmahan andAssociates; each is used by Preparing for the Drug FreeYears with permission.

3

Participants practice pulling aside one ofthe group members and using RefusalSkills'. Finally, parents and their chil-dren discuss how to handle difficult re-fusal situations such as riding in a carwhere a friend applies pressure to usedrugs or alcohol. Parents practice coach-ing their children to use refusal skills.Well-developed peer-resistance skills areexpected to increase children's protectionagainst later problem behavior.

Session 4, "Managing Family Conflict,"is aimed at reducing the risks related tofamily conflict, poor family management,and alienation and rebelliousness. Par-ents identify and discuss the strategiesthey are currently using to express angerin their families. Parents identify how an-ger in the family can threaten familybonds. Parents learn and practice skills toexpress anger constructively and controlanger without damaging family bonds.

In session 5, "Strengthening FamilyBonds," parents explore ways to strengthenprotection of their children by expandingopportunities for child involvement in thefamily. The session addresses the riskfactors of poor family management,alienation and rebelliousness, lack ofbonding to the family, and antisocial be-havior in early adolescence. Parentslearn how their children's involvement infamily maintenance, health, financial,and governance tasks strengthens familybonds. Together, parents explore cre-ative ways to expand opportunities forinvolvement in each of these four areas.Expanding family roles strengthens theprotective value of family involvementand can teach skills necessary to per-form tasks successfully. Parents practiceexpressing positive feelings and love toteenagers. Finally, session leaders provideparents with a process for developing aparenting support network to continuebeyond the PDFY sessions. Generally,about 30 percent of the workshop par-ticipants choose to continue meeting insome capacity to deal with emerging is-sues of adolescence.

Sessions are typically conducted bytwo trained workshop leaders from thecommunity. The curriculum kit consists ofa workshop leaders' guide, a companionvideotape series (one videotape for eachsession), and a family activity book foreach participating family. The workshopleaders' guide provides session objec-tives, needed materials, and a scriptedoverview of the curriculum. In addition,the guide includes detailed information onhow to conduct the parenting workshops

and provides a sample recruitment bro-chure for parents. The companion video-tapes model a variety of the targetedskills, present an accurate summary ofthe curriculum material, and present dis-cussions by parents about how the pro-gram worked in their families. The familyactivity book is also designed to summa-rize the curriculum material; it offers fam-ily meeting agendas and other suggestedactivities. At the end of each session, afamily meeting is assigned to be com-pleted during the week to transfer ses-sion content to the home setting. EachPDFY session provides parents with anopportunity to practice the upcomingfamily meeting. The family activity bookincludes pullout pages for families topost in their homes.

A variety of optional materials areavailable to supplement the basic kit.These include a question-and-answer au-diotape about risk factors to assist work-shop leaders in answering difficult ques-tions, an "ethnic adaptation guide" toassist with tailoring the curriculum forspecific ethnic groups, and a "drug freetool kit" that provides aids for recruit-ment and retention of parents.

The curriculum sessions themselves arebased on three important assumptions:

Parents can play an important role in thereduction of risk factors for adolescentproblem behaviors by their children.

Parents can protect their childrenby offering them opportunities for in-volvement within the family, teachingthem skills for success, recognizingand rewarding their involvement, andcommunicating clear family norms forappropriate behavior.Regular family meetings provide amechanism for family involvement andserve as a way to transfer the contentand skills from the curriculum into thehome environment.The PDFY program is commercially

available through Developmental Re-search and Programs. Community mem-bers, taught to conduct the workshopsby trainers from the company, can easilyimplement the PDFY program. A 3-daytraining course provides workshop lead-ers with a detailed overview of the pro-gram content, practical tips, and opportu-nities to practice delivering the programto parents in their communities.

PDFY has been offered to parents inschools, churches, community centers,homes, hospitals, and even prisons across

the country. In 1988, PDFY was the focusof a media campaign coordinated with aSeattle television affiliate and broadcastacross most of western Washington State.This campaign entailed an hour-long tele-vision special followed by community-based workshops in 87 western Washing-ton communities. Four States (Illinois,Kansas, Oregon, and West Virginia) havesponsored statewide implementations ofPDFY. Most recently, the program hasbeen implemented as part of a two-phasedexperimental evaluation in rural Iowa.

Evaluation StudiesEvaluation studies of PDFY have ad-

dressed two major issues. First, becausethe program is designed for the generalpublic, the success of dissemination ef-forts has been assessed. The questionsaddressed here are:

Does the program have a strategy fordissemination?Can a broad cross-section of parentsbe recruited for participation?Is the program appropriate, or can itbe made appropriate, for diversegroups?The second issue is the efficacy of the

program. The questions here concernthe immediate goals and the more long-term goals of the intervention:

Does the program reduce targetedrisk factors and/or enhance protec-tive factors?

Does the program achieve the ultimategoal of reducing substance abuse?

Dissemination StudiesEarly tests of PDFY were primarily de-

signed to test dissemination efforts, al-though they also often included pre- andposttest assessments of program effects.

Broadcast media dissemination. Anearly study by Hawkins, Catalano, andKent (1991) is notable in the scope of theprogram's exposure to a broad sample.This intervention began with a 1-hour tele-vision special airing at 9 p.m. PT on a Tues-day evening on the NBC affiliate station inthe greater Seattle-area media market. Anestimated 98,000 households viewed theprogram, which included a dramatizationof the consequences of teenage drug abuse,reviewed risk factors for drug abuse, andpresented family risk-reduction strategies.For 2 weeks prior to the campaign, publicservice announcements regarding the ex-istence and locations of PDFY workshopscontinued throughout the day andevening, and written promotional materi-als were distributed throughout the area.A total of 87 different workshop sites wereestablished in the area. Workshops wereled by community members who had at-tended the 3-day training program.

At least 2,497 parents voluntarily at-tended the workshops. An evaluation ofthe PDFY curriculum was conducted ata sample of 20 sites, stratified for rural,suburban, and urban locations. At thesesites, from 401 (first session) to 250 (lastsession) participants completed question-naires both before and immediately aftereach workshop. Ninety percent of the par-ents were Caucasian, and most had chil-dren in grades four through seven (the tar-geted age group). The data indicated thatthe majority of the participants (53 per-cent) had viewed the television specialand had learned about the workshops ei-ther through the special (29 percent) orthrough their child's school (72 percent;multiple responses were allowed) (seefigure 1). Only 21 percent of participantssaid they had learned of the workshopsthrough televised public service announce-ments. This televised recruitment strategyreached beyond those who traditionallyattend parenting workshops; 65 percentof the participants had not previouslyattended such a workshop.

Although attendance dropped fromthe first session to the final session inthe Seattle media market implementation,approximately 69 percent of the original

attendees completed the program. Follow-ing the final session, participants re-ported that they found the workshopsvery worthwhile. Overall sessions, exer-cises, materials, and workshop content,process, and leaders were rated highly;on a scale of 1=not worthwhile/poor to6=very worthwhile/excellent, mean rat-ings ranged from 4.8 to 5.6.

Participants also were asked to reportknowledge, attitudes, and behaviorsrelevant to the goals of the program.Planned comparisons of linked pre- andposttest scores were conducted across30 separate measures. Of these 30 mea-sures, 23 showed significant improvement..Among other changes, participants atposttest were more likely to understandthe importance of good family manage-ment, including the following elements:

Explicit family policy on drugs.

Increased motivation to teach andpractice refusal skills.

Constructive expression of angerto avoid weakening family bonds.

Active involvement of adolescentsin new family roles.

Also, during the workshops, at least59 percent of the participants reportedhaving conducted a family meeting asinstructed in PDFY (only 29 percent saidthey had periodic family meetings be-fore participating in PDFY). Although

these results are only suggestive, be-cause there was no comparison group,they indicate that the program workedand that key points were successfullycommunicated to a broad sample ofparticipants.

Statewide dissemination. The mostfully documented statewide disseminationstudy was conducted in Oregon (Heuser,1990). PDFY was implemented with fami-lies across 32 counties and within 4 Stateagencies. In all, 195 workshop groups wereorganized, 10 of which specifically tar-geted families in which the parents wereclients of various State agencies (e.g.,Adult and Family Services, Oregon De-partment of Corrections, and so on). Allworkshops were led by trained commu-nity members. A representative sampleof 46 workshops, which included 759 par-ticipants, was selected for evaluation(including 8 of the 10 State agency work-shops). This sample was 84 percent Cau-casian, and the majority of the partici-pants were parents of children in gradesfour through six (54 percent).

In Oregon, families were recruited forthe study with radio, television, andnewspaper advertisements; distributionof posters and brochures; and announce-ments at churches, schools, and publicagencies. Most participants reportedhearing about the workshops throughtheir child's school (45 percent) or froma friend or family member (34 percent),

Figure 1: Sources From Which Program Participants Learned ofWorkshops

School

Primetime TV Program

TV Public Service Announcement

Other Media

Flier or Poster

Friend or Family

Community Group

Church

Social Service Agency or Counselor

Other

7

0

I I I I I

10 20 30 40 50

Percent

Note: More than one possible (n=401).

60 70 80

5

although most State agency participantswere recruited directly by the agency.Again, a large proportion of those re-cruited had never attended a parentingworkshop. Sixty-five percent of the pub-lic and 68 percent of the agency partici-pants had never attended a parentingworkshop before, and more than 90 per-cent of both groups had never attendeda drug prevention workshop. Over thecourse of the workshop sessions, overallattendance fell approximately 33 percent(the dropout rate was approximately 31percent in the public group and 42 percentin the agency group). However, followingeach workshop, participants indicatedasthey had in Washingtonthat they foundthe curriculum worthwhile and reportedimprovements in each of the workshopobjectives (co. figure 9).

On a scale of 0 (no value at all) to 10(highest value), participants in the Or-egon workshops were asked to rate thevalue of the workshop for "[their] plansto work with [their] children to preventdrug abuse." Mean responses rangedfrom 8.5 to 9.1.

To assess the effectiveness of the PDFYprogram in terms of knowledge gain andattitude change, paired t-tests were used tocompare pre- and posttest scores across 36different items. These analyses were con-ducted separately for the public sample,which was not considered to be at highrisk, and the high-risk agency sample. Forthe public sample, significant improve-ments were found for 28 of the 36 items.Among the participants who constitutedthe high-risk agency sample, there weresignificant improvements in 16 of the 36items. When specifically asked whetherthey had conducted a family meeting in thepast week, as each PDFY session instructedthem to do, up to 61 percent of the familiesin the public sample reported having doneso, as did up to 49 percent of the families inthe agency sample.

Another statewide dissemination ofPDFY took place in Kansas with theKansas Family Initiative. Although thespecifics of implementation and effec-tiveness are not as well documented asthey were in Oregon, the Kansas effortwas extensive, involving more than 500trained volunteers to lead workshopsacross the State. As before, almost allparticipants (91-94 percent) reportedpositive attitudes about the program andits usefulness. They also reported sub-stantial knowledge gain and skills acqui-sition (up to 22-percent improvement)from most sessions, and 84-90 percent

felt they had learned how to implementnew skills at home.

Together, these findings indicate thatstatewide implementations of PDFY havebeen successful in targeting the intendedaudience (parents of preteens) and thatthese parents find the program worth-while and of high value. In addition, al-though results vary, there are indicationsthat PDFY sessions are improving parents'knowledge and changing important atti-tudes and behaviors relevant to later teensubstance use. Although they did not in-clude documented evaluations, additionalstatewide disseminations of PDFY haveoccurred in Illinois and West Virginia.

Dissemination in ethnic minoritycommunities. A PDFY study by Harachi,Catalann, and I-IalArltin (1997) spannedmore than~2 years and targeted familiesof color. Naturally existing social net-works or structures serving minoritypopulations were identified for recruit-ment and for workshop sites. For ex-ample, a church that conducts servicesin Spanish proved to be helpful in re-cruiting Hispanic participants. Projectstaff contacted the networks and sites tosolicit support for the program and toinquire about using their structures assites for the parenting workshops. In ad-dition to churches, community recre-ation centers, schools, and social ser-vice agencies were often very helpful.Many parents were recruited by trainedrecruiters hired from the targeted com-munities, by direct calls from workshop

leaders, and by informational brochuresleft at targeted locations. In addition, re-cruiters contacted personal networks,made announcements at communityevents, and organized some door-to-doorefforts. Calls were made to phone num-bers pulled from various directories andlists provided by cooperating organiza-tions such as schools, churches, andcommunity associations.

Workshops were conducted by trainedcommunity members whose ethnicity andspoken language (when English was a sec-ond language) were congruent with thetarget population. Throughout the train-ing, workshop leaders were encouraged toadapt the PDFY curriculum to meet thespecific needs of the families in their targetcommunities. The training included ex-amples of how the program content couldbe tailored to different audiences and howdelivery methods could be tailored to dif-ferent learning styles across cultures. Oneinitial adaptation made by the group wasmarketing the workshops as a program to"strengthen and support families" ratherthan explicitly to prevent drug use. Work-shop leaders felt that this strategy bettercommunicated the program's positivefocus.

In all, 27 different workshops were imple-mented with a total of 455 participants.More than 64 percent of the sample wereforeign born. Figure 3 shows the breakdownof participants' ethnic backgrounds.

Workshop leaders were encouraged toadapt the curriculum and include other

Figure 2: Mean Improvements in Parents' Reports on Their Families

5.0

4.5

4.0

3.5

3.0

2.5

2.0Family Family Re usa Managing Family

Meetings Expectations Skills Conflict Bonds

pi Before PDFY

NI After PDFY

Source: From the Oregon statewide implementation (Heuser, 1990).Note: Results are descriptive, based on quasi-experimental pretest-posttest design (n=129).

6

material they believed would be appro-priate for the parents in their workshops.Although PDFY is designed to be offeredin five sessions, most of the workshopsranged from five to nine sessions. Morethan half of the groups (59 percent) incor-porated additional topics into the work-shops, often including additional familymanagement practices such as monitoringstrategies, appropriate discipline tech-niques, and definitions of child abuse. Thelatter topic was especially relevant to im-migrant families who were unfamiliar withchild abuse laws in the United States.Nearly two-thirds (67 percent) of the work-shops for Hispanic and Samoan parentsincluded discussions of and skill-buildingexercises on parent-child communication.Workshop leaders in about 40 percent ofthe workshops with Hispanic and African-American families added a discussion onhandling discrimination, targeted either atthe parent or at the child.

The method of delivery differed morethan the content from the suggested formatand methods. For example, most work-shops conducted in Spanish or Samoan didnot use videotapes. In general, the work-shops were less interactive than suggestedby the curriculum. Large group discussionformats were used, and less time was pro-vided for individual skill practice.

The most effective recruitment mecha-nisms for these different groups includedstrategies to access personal social net-works, such as churches (for Hispanicsand Samoans), schools (for African Ameri-cans), and friends (for Samoans and Na-tive Americans). Although this evaluationdid not assess satisfaction with or effec-tiveness of the program directly, it didreport attendance patterns. Approxi-mately 55 percent of participants attendedat least half of the offered sessions. (Thestudy did not report specific dropout ratesfrom the first to final sessions becauseworkshop leaders often added sessions,depending on the needs of their specificgroups, and dropout rates would not havebeen comparable with other studies.)Many parents cited their work schedulesand other time conflicts as the most com-mon reasons for nonattendance. Neverthe-less, most parents (71 percent) had neverattended any kind of parenting workshop,and 85 percent had never attended a drugprevention workshop before. The turnoutreported here suggests both the needfor prevention workshops in diversecommunities (Hawkins and Salisbury,1983) and the efficacy of using culturallyappropriate recruitment strategies.

Figure 3: Ethnic Composition of PDFY Dissemination TargetingFamilies of Color

Native American6%

Caucasian7%

Samoan17%

Other5%

African American20%

Source: Harachi, Catalano, and Hawkins, 1997.

Hispanic45%

Project FamilyPilot phase. Recently, the PDFY cur-

riculum has been tested experimentallywith families in rural Iowa. This study ispart of Project Family, a series of studiesconducted at Iowa State University, andfor which Richard Spoth is the principalinvestigator, in collaboration with theSocial Development Research Group atthe University of Washington. In the pilotphase of this project (Spoth et al., 1995),all families with sixth and seventh gradechildren in nine different schools werecalled and invited to participate (387families were invited). The schools hadbeen selected from districts meeting eli-gibility requirements for the federallysupported school lunch program. Al-though not all families were eligible forschool lunch benefits, the median annualper capita income was $6,800 ($27,200for a family of four). A total of 209 familiescompleted the pretest, and 175 (84 per-cent) of these families completed the finalposttest assessment. Each family wasoffered a financial incentive of approxi-mately $10 per hour per family memberfor time devoted to study assessments.No monetary incentives were providedfor attending the PDFY sessions. Virtuallyall participants were Caucasian.

Attendance records indicate that mostparents assigned to the interventiongroup attended most of the PDFY ses-sions; 88 percent of enrolled mothers and

8

69 percent of enrolled fathers attendedthree or more sessions; nearly one-half ofthe mothers (47 percent) and one-third ofthe fathers (32 percent) attended all fivesessions. The mean attendance was 3.9sessions for enrolled mothers and 3.1sessions for enrolled fathers.

The Iowa PDFY experiment involvedmore extensive data collection regardingeffectiveness than the previous studies.In addition to more indepth writtenquestionnaires assessing knowledge,attitudes, and self-reported behavior,families also were videotaped in two struc-tured interaction tasks. One focused ongeneral questions concerning family life(chores, roles, parental monitoring), andthe other focused on family problem solv-ing. After the families were randomly as-signed to the intervention condition or thewaitlist control condition (to receive thecurriculum following data collection), theycompleted questionnaires and appearedon videotape at both pretest and posttest.Posttest assessments occurred approxi-mately 2-9 weeks following the PDFY ses-sions. The waitlist control conditiongroup received no intervention duringthis time. As in other PDFY implementa-tions, workshops were led by membersof the communities in which they wereconducted (workshop leaders received4 days of training). Data on the fidelity ofthe PDFY implementation by these lead-ers were also collected.

7

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Results of this evaluation provided thestrongest evidence yet for both the fidelityof PDFY when administered by communitymembers in an efficacy trial and the im-pact of the program itself in teaching skillsand changing behaviors. Observations ofworkshop leaders revealed that, althoughthere was some variability in coverage ofthe program content, each pair of leaderscovered most of the curriculum and thateach pair covered each of the core pro-gram concepts. The observation scoresindicated that the workshop leaders cov-ered 74-82 percent of the full PDFY cur-riculum content.

With regard to program impact, analysesof parent outcome measures (controllingfor pretest measures) indicated significantoverall improvement on intervention-targeted parenting behaviors and generalchild management skills as reported byparents (Spoth et al., 1995) (see figure 4).

In other analyses examining thesedata, outcomes targeted by the specificintervention sessions were tested sepa-rately, using both the self-reported andvideotaped assessments (Kosterman etal., 1997, 1998). Specifically, results indi-cated that mothers in the PDFY groupwere significantly more likely to:

Report that they give rewards to theirchildren for good behavior.Communicate rules regarding sub-stance use.Punish their children appropriatelyfor misbehavior.

Restrict their children's alcohol use.Expect their children to refuse beerfrom a friend.

Express less conflict with their spouses.

Work at being more involved withtheir children.Fathers in the intervention group

also reported significantly more com-munication of rules regarding substanceuse to their children and more involve-ment with their children. Observationsyielded results that were consistentwith the self-reported findings. Mothersin the intervention group exhibited sig-nificantly more proactive communica-tion, less conflict, and more improve-ment in relationship quality or bondingwith their children than mothers in thecontrol group (although the latter find-ing was significant at only p<.06). Fa-thers in the intervention group alsoexhibited significantly more proactivecommunication and better relationshipquality or bonding than fathers in thecontrol group. All of these outcomeswere goals of specific sessions in thePDFY curriculum.

As a further check on the validity ofthe findings from the Iowa PDFY study,additional analyses examined:

Effects of the intervention on out-comes that were superficially similarto targeted measures but that were nottargeted by PDFY.

Increments in improvement when theintervention group was restricted toonly those who attended specific PDFYsessions (Kosterman et al., 1998).

These analyses were conducted todemonstrate that specific PDFY objec-tives were linked with specific outcomesand that these effects were not due tomore global causes such as parentsmerely being aware that they were part ofan intervention or desiring to impress the

researchers with the "right answer." In-deed, no significant differences betweenintervention and control groups werefound among the six nontargeted parent-ing behaviors examined in the study butnot addressed in PDFY workshops. Forexample, while mothers in the PDFYgroup reported being more likely to re-ward their children (as instructed inPDFY), they were not significantly morelikely to receive rewards from their chil-dren or to reward or receive rewards fromtheir spouses (not instructed in PDFY).While both mothers and fathers assignedto PDFY reported more involvement withtheir children (included in PDFY), theydid not report more involvement witheach other (not included in PDFY). Alongsimilar lines, there was evidence that thesubgroup of parents who actuaiiy at-tended specific workshops showedgreater improvement on reported parent-ing behaviors emphasized in those work-shops than the entire experimental group,which included nonattendees. Comparedwith the entire experimental group, theattendees demonstrated more improve-ment for 19 of 28 (68 percent) targetedbehaviors, but only 4 of 12 (33 percent)nontargeted behaviors. These findingshelp to further link improvement in spe-cific behaviors to attendance at specificPDFY sessions.

Trial phase. Additional results areavailable from an experimental studywith followup assessments also involv-ing rural Iowa families. Most of the criti-cal features of the second experimentwere identical to the pilot study, exceptfor the inclusion of a larger sample, aschool-based random assignment tocondition (i.e., all students at a schoolwere randomly assigned to the samecondition), and a longer followup period(1 and 2 years posttreatment). In all, 360sixth grade students and their parentscompleted both pretest and posttestmeasures. Among enrolled families, 93percent attended three or more sessions,and 63 percent attended all five sessions.Initial findings replicate those of the pilotstudy. Among parents assigned to thePDFY curriculum, intervention-targetedparenting behaviors showed significantimprovement for both mothers and fa-thers, consistent with PDFY objectives(no differences between schools werefound on these measures within the PDFYand control conditions). More recent find-ings on long-term followup indicate sus-tained improvements in parent behaviorsand subsequent reductions in children's

smoking and drinking behaviors (Spoth,Redmond, and Shin, 1998; Spoth et al.,1997, 1998).

Implementation IssuesDespite the positive findings reviewed

above, perhaps the greatest overall chal-lenge to the effective implementation of auniversal delinquency and drug abuseprevention program is the recruitmentand retention of parents. Schools andcommunities have been successful whenthey have used multiple strategies to ef-fectively recruit and retain parents inPDFY. The most successful strategies ap-pear to be those that remove commonbarriers to participation. These strategiesinclude offering the program at varioustimes and in various locations accessibleby the targeted population, providingchildcare and food for the sessions, andoffering transportation when needed. Avariety of other strategies have been usedeffectively to recruit parents, including:

Raffling off a bicycle (or other prizes)to parents who attend at least fourworkshop sessions.Using teachers and principals atchildren's schools to promote theprogram.

Engaging local print or televisionmedia to promote the workshopsor cover them as a story.Offering enjoyable corresponding pro-grams for youth that take place duringthe parenting workshops.

Additionally, it is important to involvepeople in the community who are trustedand respectedfor example, local clergy,other parents, community role models,and representatives of the local media.

Recruitment strategies must be tai-lored to the individual needs of the com-munity where the program is being of-fered. No single approach will work everytime or in every community. One PDFYtrainer from Vancouver, WA, summed upthe situation when she said, "We've hadthe most success when we've had volun-teers at the school who have beenthrough the program and are outgoing innature. Having gone through the pro-gram, they're comfortable standing upand talking about this program. When wehave this kind of support we've alwaysfilled each workshop" (Hawkins andCatalano, 1992:98). Creativity, commit-ment, and imagination are often the mostimportant tools for parent recruitment.

SummaryTogether, these studies provide prom-

ising evidence that the PDFY program isappropriate for general and diversepopulations and that it can be success-fully disseminated. Most important,these studies show that PDFY improvesparenting practices in ways that reducerisk factors and enhance protective fac-tors for adolescent problem behaviors.The initial pre- and posttest single-groupevaluations described here demonstratethe acceptability and applicability of

Figure 4: PDFY and Control Group Improvements in ParentingOutcome Means, by Experimental Condition

4.3

4.2 - ControlMothers

4.1 PDFY ProgramFathers

4.0Mothers Fathers

3.9

3.8

3.7

3.6

3.5

Interven ion-SpecificParenting Skills

General Ch'IdManagement Skills

Source: Spoth et al., 1995.Note: Significance levels for all analysis of covariance (ANCOVA) tests were significant at p<0.5.

PDFY and the program's effectiveness inteaching key parenting concepts to avery broad voluntary audience. Thesestudies also suggest that participatingfamilies are likely to implement familymeetings, a central objective of the cur-riculum. The experimental findings arepromising in several respects. As be-fore, these studies demonstrate theapplicability of PDFY when looking atspecific targeted outcomes. Data fromthe observations of workshop leadersshow that training community membersto lead workshops is effective. In addi-tion, the studies show that most par-ents, once they agree to participate inthe program, will attend most of thePDFY sessions.

As communities and schools identifyand prioritize risk and protective factors,it is important to consider effective parent-ing programs as critical components ofcomprehensive prevention strategies.PDFY offers schools and communities awell-researched, universal parenting pro-gram that enhances protective factors,reduces risk factors, and ultimately de-creases problem behaviors among teens.

For FurtherInformation

To find out more about program de-velopment, dissemination, and training,contact Developmental Research andPrograms, 130 Nickerson Street, Suite107, Seattle, WA 98109; 800-736-2630,206-286-1462 (Fax); www.drp.org(Internet).

ReferencesBrewer, D.D., Hawkins, J.D., Catalano,

R.F., and Neckerman, H.J. 1995. Prevent-ing serious, violent and chronic juvenileoffending: A review of evaluations ofselected strategies in childhood, adoles-cence, and the community. In Source-book: Serious, Violent, and ChronicJuvenile Offenders, edited by J.C. Howell,B. Krisberg, J.D. Hawkins, and J.J. Wilson.Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications,pp. 61-141.

Harachi, T.W., Catalano, R.F., andHawkins, J.D. 1997. Effective recruitmentfor parenting programs within ethnic mi-nority communities. Child and AdolescentSocial Work Journal 14(1):23 -39.

Hawkins, J.D., Arthur, M.W., andCatalano, R.F. 1995. Preventing substanceabuse. In Building a Safer Society: Strategic

0

Approaches to Crime Prevention, Crimeand Justice series volume 19, edited by M.Tonry and D. Farmington. Chicago, IL: Chi-cago University Press, pp. 343-427.

Hawkins, J.D., and Catalano, R.F. 1992.Communities That Care: Action for DrugAbuse Prevention. San Francisco, CA:Jossey-Bass Publishers.

Hawkins, J.D., Catalano, R.F., and Kent,L.A. 1991. Combining broadcast mediaand parent education to prevent teenagedrug abuse. In Persuasive Communicationand Drug Abuse Prevention, edited by L.Donohew, H.E. Sypher, and W.J. Bukoski.Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associ-ates, pp. 283-294.

Hawkins, J.D., Catalano, R.F., andMiller, J.Y. 1992. Risk and protective fac-tors for alcohol and other drug problemsin adolescence and early adulthood: Im-plications for substance abuse preven-tion. Psychological Bulletin 112(1):64-105.

Hawkins, J.D., and Salisbury, B.R.1983. Delinquency prevention programsfor minorities of color. Social Work Re-search and Abstracts 19(4):5-12.

Heuser, J.P. 1990. A preliminary evalu-ation of the short-term impact of thePreparing for the Drug Free Years com-munity service program in Oregon. Un-published manuscript. Salem, OR:Oregon Department of Justice, CrimeAnalysis Center.

Kosterman, R., Hawkins, J.D.,Haggerty, K.P., Spoth, R., and Redmond,C. 1998. Preparing for the Drug FreeYears: Session specific effects of a uni-versal parent training intervention withrural families. Unpublished manuscript.Seattle, WA: University of Washington,School of Social Work.

Kosterman, R., Hawkins, J.D., Spoth,R., Haggerty, K.P., and Zhu, K. 1997. Ef-fects of preventive parent training inter-vention on observed family interactions:Proximal outcomes from Preparing forthe Drug Free Years. Journal of Commu-nity Psychology 25(4):277-292.

Resnick, M.D., Bearman, P.S., Blum,R.W., Bauman, K.E., Harris, K.M., Jones,J., Tabor, J., Beuhring, T., Sieving, R.E.,show M IrPland, M Rearingpr I I-I and

Udry, J.R. 1997. Protecting adolescentsfrom harm: Findings from the NationalLongitudinal Study on AdolescentHealth. Journal of the American MedicalAssociation 278(10):823-832.

Spoth, R., Redmond, C., Haggerty, K.,and Ward, T. 1995. A controlled outcomestudy examining individual differenceand attendance effects. Journal of Pri-mary Prevention 57(May):449-464.

AcknowledgmentsThis Bulletin was prepared by Kevin Haggerty, M.S.W., Rick Kosterman, Ph.D.,Richard F. Catalano, Ph.D., and J. David Hawkins, Ph.D., Social DevelopmentResearch Group, School of Social Work, University of Washington.

The authors gratefully acknowledge Richard Spoth and Cleve Redmond for theircollaboration on the implementation of PDFY in Project Family data analyses.

Work on this paper was supported by research grant DA 070 29-01A1 from theNational Institute on Drug Abuse.

Photographs pages 2, 4, and 8 copyright © 1998 Corbis Corporation;photograph page 3 copyright 1998 Weststock.

Spoth, R., Redmond, C., Hockaday, C.,and Yoo, S. 1997. Protective factors andyoung adolescent tendency to abstainfrom alcohol use: A model using twowaves of intervention study data. Ameri-can Journal of Community Psychology24(December):749-770.

Spoth, R., Redmond, C., and Shin, C.1998. Direct and indirect latent parentingoutcomes of two universal family-focused preventive interventions: Ex-tending a public health-oriented re-search base. Journal of Consulting andClinical Psychology 66(April):385-399.

Spoth, R., Redmond, C., Shin, C.,Lepper, H., Haggerty, K., and Wall, M.1998. Risk moderation of proximalparent-child outcomes of a universalfamily f^-,,.°A r----V-e intervention:A test and replication. American Journalof Orthopsychiatry 68(4):565-579.

Points of view or opinions expressed in thisdocument are those of the authors and donot necessarily represent the official positionor policies of OJJDP or the U.S. Department ofJustice.

The Office of Juvenile Justice and Delin-quency Prevention is a component of the Of-fice of Justice Programs, which also includesthe Bureau of Justice Assistance, the Bureauof Justice Statistics, the National Institute ofJustice, and the Office for Victims of Crime.

Additional Resources

Athletic Initiative Against Drugs(www.ondcpsports.org/)

This initiative is designed to mobilizethe athletic world to educate childrenabout the dangers of drugs andprovide them with positive opportuni-ties to keep them away from drugs. Itis based on four principles: gettingyoung people involved, coachingyouth away from drugs, shapingattitudes, and producing results.

NIDA Goes to School(www.nida.nih.gov/backtoschool/nidab2s.html)

This Web site features a new scienceeducation initiative for middle schoolstudents and teachers. It presents theMind Over Matter Series, which isdesigned to encourage young peoplein grades five through nine to learnabout the effects of drug abuse on thebody and the brain.

Parenting IS Prevention Project(www.emory.edu/NFIA/PIPP/index.html)

This Web site was created by parents forparents. It provides practical advice forparents on talking to their children aboutdrugs, gives warning signs to help parentsidentify drug abuse, and provides tips forhelping young people stay drug free.

The Parents' Hub(www.mediacampaign.org/parents/parents.html)

The Parents' Hub is an Internet guideto keeping young people healthy anddrug free. It provides information onwhat drugs look like, how to find help,and how to talk to youth about makingpositive choices. This resource includesan action plan for families to use inraising drug-free children.

Project KNOW(www.projectknow.com/)

Project KNOW is a Web site thatsupports the National Youth Anti-DrugMedia Campaign, an initiative led bythe Office of National Drug ControlPolicy in collaboration with the Partner-ship for a Drug-Free America. Itsmission is to tell the truth about drugsfrom the perspective of youth, parents,and experts. The best way to avoidproblems is to "KNOW" the truthabout drugs.

Your TimeTheir Future(www.health.org/yourtime/)

Your TimeTheir Future is a nationalpublic education campaign developedby the U.S. Department of Health andHuman Services. The campaign en-courages adults to become involvedin volunteering, mentoring, and otherefforts that help young people ages7 to 14 participate in positive activi-ties that build skills, self-discipline,and competence.

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