A SCHOOL-BASED PROGRAM TO PREVENT INHALANT USE IN ALASKA

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DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): A three-year study of an adapted evidence-based substance abuse prevention program for American Indians is proposed to combat inhalant use and other drug use among youth in communities with varying proportions of Alaska Natives (Yupik, Tingit, and Inupiat), Caucasians, and other populations. The study aims are to (a) adapt an evidence-based drug prevention program to be implemented in rural Alaska elementary schools and (b) conduct a pilot test to assess its implementation quality, factors that may be associated with implementation quality, program effects, and factors that might explain any program effects noted. The primary outcomes of this study are cognitive and behavioral skills mediators that are believed to mediate the program's potential effects on inhalant use among pre-adolescents. To achieve these outcomes, an evidence-based school drug prevention training program will be adapted to increase cognitive and behavioral skills to resist the use of inhalants among pre-adolescents in rural Alaskan communities. Agreements have been obtained from school systems in 16 communities in rural Alaska to participate in the study in which eight pairs of communities will be randomly assigned to experimental and control conditions. The 16 communities, most of which only have only one elementary school, will represent a mixture of secondary and tertiary service centers and feeder Alaska Native villages that are located in various regions of the state, with population size ranging from 433 to 8,835. This study will focus attention on reducing a drug problem that has received little attention among a high risk and underserved population.