Multimedia Divorce Education for Latino Parents

描述（由研究者提供）：本I期申请提出

DESCRIPTION (provided by investigator): This Phase I application proposes development of the DivorceCARE en Espanol, an interactive, multimedia-based prevention strategy designed to help Spanish-speaking parents facilitate their children's effective postdivorce adjustment. The program is conceptualized as a critical addition to the larger Divorce Child Adjustment Resource & Education (DivorceCARE) program, a NIDA-funded suite of divorce-related multimedia prevention programs currently under development at lnflexxion. Court sponsored divorce education programs are mandated in more than 45 states throughout the country. Yet, currently none of the available programs are offered in Spanish or are tailored to the needs of Latino parents. As a result, Latino parents with little English-speaking abilities are typically exempted from the court mandate and left without options for obtaining important divorce-related intervention services. To address this issue, DivorceCARE en Espanol will be a Latino-sensitive program offered in Spanish. Phase I will define the components of the program, outline the companion Website and program manual, develop prototypes of the computer interface, and produce and test a demo CD-ROM. Phase II involves completion of the program and a field test to demonstrate efficacy and product satisfaction. PROPOSED COMMERCIAL APPLICATION: The commercial impact of the project is extraordinarily promising. Although the majority of states throughout the country require parents with minor children seeking a divorce to attend a divorce education class as a condition for obtaining judicial relief, there are no Spanish- language or Latino-sensitive programs available. Yet, there are currently about 35 million Latinos living in the U.S., making them the largest minority population in the country. From 1995 to 2050, more Latinos are expected to join the U.S. population than persons from any other ethnic group, ensuring this product will have a large and expanding market for years to come.