LONGITUDINAL EVALUATION OF AIDS PREVENTION INTERVENTION

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DESCRIPTION: (Adapted from Applicant's Abstract). During the first funding period "Focus on Kids", a university-community partnership, developed and implemented a developmentally and culturally tailored AIDS-risk reduction intervention based on Protection Motivation Theory, targeting naturally occurring friendship groups of African-American youth 9 to 15 years of age living in urban public housing. The intervention impact is being assessed through a randomized, controlled clinical trial involving 76 friendship groups (383 youth) recruited from public housing developments. Bi-annual follow-up of the youth has been ongoing for 1.5 years employing a culturally and developmentally based risk assessment instrument to monitor changes in risk perception, risk intention and risk/protective behaviors. The 6-month intervention evaluation was strong in that condom use rates were 19% higher among intervention youth than among control youth; thus the investigators believe it is important to continue to follow this unique cohort of low- income, urban African-American early adolescents to monitor both the long-term intervention impact and the natural evolution of risk perception and risk behavior. However, 12-months post-intervention the intervention impact on condom use had waned. Thus, it is imperative to provide boosters and to continue to explore new approaches to sustain intervention impact. Therefore, during this evaluation period, the investigators also propose to investigate 3 findings from their first funding phase: youth perceive low rates of parental monitoring; monitoring is inversely correlated with risk behavior; and parents perceive themselves as ineffective in their monitoring. It is important to assess the range of current monitoring practices in low-income urban settings and to design interventions to fortify parental monitoring practices. While there has been limited evaluation of parenting interventions, in low income urban settings, culturally-appropriate home-viewed videos have shown some promise in this role. Accordingly, the current proposal requests funding to: 1) Continue follow-up of the current experimental cohort for an additional 3 years to assess the natural history of AIDS-risk and protective behaviors and perceptions in this high-risk, community-based population and the long-term impact of the intervention on selected AIDS-related behaviors, behavioral intentions, and risk perceptions. Project activities to be supported include: the semi-annual administration of the YHRBI to the 383 youth in the longitudinal evaluation for 3 years; and support for 2 annual intervention "booster sessions" to be conducted at 9 recreation centers. (2) Explore parental monitoring practices and perceptions in an urban, low-income setting and develop a parental monitoring intervention - component which increases actual and perceived monitoring by parents. Project activities to be supported include: focus group discussions; pile-sorts; pilot testing of monitoring scales; development of an outcomes monitoring instrument and process instrument; production of a culturally appropriate parenting video; a randomized, controlled trial of impact of the video intervention on 240 parents and their children aged 12 to 16 who are residents in 6 public housing developments.