An Online Bystander Intervention to Prevent Teen Relationship Violence

描述(申请人提供)：青少年关系暴力(TRV)可对青少年的身心健康构成直接和严重的威胁。许多高中提供暴力预防课程，但很少有经过严格评估的，在少数几所在降低暴力发生率方面表现出积极效果的学校中，大多数都很漫长，和/或需要训练有素的调解人。简而言之，有必要开发具有成本效益的方法来预防TRV。这项拟议的研究将评估一种创新的在线旁观者干预，它有可能比目前旨在预防TRV的计划更具成本效益。我们将招收240名9-12年级的高中生，他们将被随机分配到在线旁观者干预条件或在线控制条件下。将有3个主要评估点(基线、治疗后、6个月随访)。除了使用评估旁观者行为的标准方法外，拟议的研究还将使用一种利用虚拟现实对旁观者行为进行创新的观察性评估。我们相信，这种新方法可能会比自我报告方法提供更有力的证据来证明计划的有效性。此外，拟议的研究旨在深入了解治疗效果的调节剂和调节剂。如果在线干预增加了旁观者的行为，阻止了TRV，或者如果它减少了青少年的TRV实施，这项研究将为大规模评估干预奠定基础。一个有效的在线计划在努力降低TRV方面将具有巨大的潜力，因为它可以被广泛且具有成本效益地实施。

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): Teen relationship violence (TRV) can pose immediate and serious threats to a teen's physical and mental health. Many high schools offer violence prevention programs, but few have been rigorously evaluated, and of the few that have demonstrated positive effects in reducing rates of violence, most are lengthy and/or require highly trained facilitators. In short, there is a need to develop cost-effective methods for preventing TRV. The proposed research will evaluate an innovative online bystander intervention, which has the potential to be much more cost-effective than current programs designed to prevent TRV. We will recruit 240 high-school students, grades 9-12, who will be randomly assigned to the online bystander intervention condition or to an online control condition. There will be 3 primary assessment points (baseline, post-treatment, 6-month follow-up). In addition to using standard methods of assessing bystander behavior, the proposed research will use an innovative observational assessment of bystander behavior that makes use of virtual reality. We believe this new method has the potential to offer stronger evidence of program efficacy than self-report methods alone. Furthermore, the proposed research is designed to gain insights into mediators and moderators of treatment effects. If the online intervention increases bystander behavior in a manner that deters TRV, or if it reduces teens' TRV perpetration, this research will lay the groundwork for a large-scale evaluation of the intervention. An effective online program would have enormous potential in efforts to reduce TRV, because it could be implemented broadly and cost-effectively.