Affect Management Intervention for Early Adolescents with Mental Health Problems

描述(由申请人提供)：早期青少年由于在发育期间开始的危险行为(例如，无保护措施的性行为、药物滥用)而面临感染艾滋病毒的风险，延迟开始这种风险可能会对青少年未来的健康产生重大影响。大约20%的青少年有心理健康问题，这些问题损害了他们的功能，这些青少年感染艾滋病毒的风险更大。此外，在有心理健康问题的人中常见的情绪反应似乎干扰了在传统健康教育或艾滋病毒预防计划中学习的认知技能的使用。此外，与情绪有关的能力在青春期早期仍在发展中。这些发现表明，可以接触到有心理健康问题的早期青少年的干预措施在解决与风险情况相关的情感因素方面发挥了重要作用，例如涉及性、酒精和药物的情况，以减少艾滋病毒危险行为。这个项目将是一个有经验的艾滋病毒预防研究团队和一个公立学校环境之间的独特合作，以开发一种情感管理干预措施，用于有心理健康问题的早期青少年。该项目将以艾滋病毒危险行为的社会个人框架为指导，并将从干预发展阶段开始，包括个人访谈、焦点小组、专家小组审查、脚本编写、试点小组和结构化访谈。在制定干预措施后，将对120名七年级学生进行情感管理干预与只关注对照(一般健康促进干预)的初步随机对照试验。对情感管理干预措施在减少性风险方面的有效性的估计将取决于自我报告的性行为减少、情绪调节技能的改善以及与艾滋病毒和禁欲相关的态度的差异。这项研究将与罗德岛的Pawtucket学区合作，制作一种新的干预措施，将情感管理与早期青少年中的风险相关因素联系起来，以便为制定更大的艾滋病毒预防干预研究计划提供信息，该计划利用学校环境来识别风险最高的人。从这个项目中获得的信息将提高我们对如何防止青少年从事艾滋病毒危险行为的理解。

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): Early adolescents are at risk for HIV due to risk behaviors (e.g., unprotected sex, substance abuse) initiated during this developmental period, and delaying initiation into this risk can have a significant impact on an adolescent's future health. Approximately 20% of adolescents have mental health problems that impair their functioning, and these teens are at even greater risk for HIV. In addition, emotional reactivity common among those with mental health problems appears to interfere with the use of cognitive skills learned in traditional health education or HIV prevention programs. Furthermore, abilities related to emotion are still developing in early adolescence. These findings suggest an important role for an intervention that can reach early adolescents with mental health problems to address emotional factors associated with risk situations, such as those involving sex, alcohol, and drugs, in order to reduce HIV risk behaviors. This project will be a unique collaboration between an experienced HIV prevention research team and a public school setting to develop an Affect Management intervention for use with early adolescents who have mental health problems. The project will be guided by the Social Personal Framework of HIV Risk Behavior and will begin with an intervention development phase including individual interviews, focus groups, expert panel reviews, scripting, pilot groups, and structured interviews. After the intervention has been developed, a preliminary randomized control trial of the Affect Management intervention in comparison to an attention-only control (general health promotion intervention) will be conducted with 120 seventh graders. An estimate of the efficacy of the Affect Management intervention in reducing sexual risk will be determined by less self-reported sexual behavior, improved emotion regulation skills, and differences in HIV- and abstinence-related attitudes. This study will partner with the Pawtucket School District in Rhode Island to produce a novel intervention that relates Affect Management to factors relevant to risk among early adolescents in order to inform the development of a larger research program of HIV prevention intervention that uses school settings to identify those most at risk. The information gained in this project will improve our understanding of how to prevent early teens from engaging in HIV risk behaviors.