Promoting Health and Reducing Risk among Hispanic Sexual Minority Youth and their Families

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PROJECT SUMMARY Sexual minority youth (SMY) in general, and Hispanic sexual minority youth in particular (HSMY), report higher levels of drug use and depressive symptoms, compared to their heterosexual and sexual minority peers. Moreover, negative health outcomes (e.g., drug use) are even higher for HSMY who disclose to parents who are unaccepting of their sexual minority youth. In fact, youth disclosure initiates a transition process where parents may struggle to adjust to youth being a sexual minority, potentially leading to poor family functioning (e.g., poor communication and low family support). Further, some parents may not know how to be supportive of their youth and adolescents may lack the needed skills to manage stress and negative reactions that may have reverberating psychological effects. Given the impact of these co-occurring factors, it is critical to develop and evaluate family-based preventive interventions to prevent or reduce the adverse health risks that HSMY face. Interventions need to account for the unique experiences of HSMY and their families, including the interplay of racism and homophobia, cultural values, family rejection/support, family functioning, and individual level variables. Currently, there are no evidence-based, family-based preventive interventions that target drug use and depressive symptoms among HSMY. Our team has begun work to fill this important scientific gap by developing, pilot testing, and publishing on a family-based preventive intervention for HSMY, Familias con Orgullo (Families with Pride). Given the promising findings for Familias con Orgullo on drug use and depressive symptoms, the primary goal of this study is to evaluate, in a randomized controlled trial with 306 HSMY and their parents, the efficacy of Familias con Orgullo on preventing/reducing adolescent drug use (both frequency and quantity) and depressive symptoms. The aims of the study are: AIM 1: Examine the efficacy of Familias con Orgullo, compared to community practice, in decreasing past 90-day drug use (frequency and quantity) and depressive symptoms among HSMY, over 30-months. AIM 2: Examine whether the relationship between intervention condition and the outcomes are partially mediated by parent support for the adolescent, parent acceptance, family functioning, adolescent stress, and sexual minority stress (e.g., discrimination). Exploratory AIM 3: Explore whether gender and baseline levels of parent support for the adolescent, parent acceptance, family functioning, adolescent stress, and sexual minority stress moderate intervention effects on the youth outcomes.