Promoting Healthy Adolescent Romantic Relationships: Results of a Multisite, Two-group Parallel Randomized Clinical Trial.

Autor: Owora AH; Department of Pediatrics, Indiana University School of Medicine, Indianapolis, Indiana; Department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics, Indiana University School of Public Health-Bloomington, Bloomington, Indiana., Houghton RF; Department of Applied Health Science, Indiana University School of Public Health-Bloomington, Bloomington, Indiana., Ferrand JL; Department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics, Indiana University School of Public Health-Bloomington, Bloomington, Indiana., Parker E; Department of Applied Health Science, Indiana University School of Public Health-Bloomington, Bloomington, Indiana., Anderson P; ETR Associates, Scotts Valley, California., Coyle K; ETR Associates, Scotts Valley, California., Guinosso S; ETR Associates, Scotts Valley, California., Walsh-Buhi ER; Department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics, Indiana University School of Public Health-Bloomington, Bloomington, Indiana; School of Public Health, San Diego State University, San Diego, California. Electronic address: erwals@iu.edu.
Jazyk: angličtina
Zdroj: The Journal of adolescent health : official publication of the Society for Adolescent Medicine [J Adolesc Health] 2024 Jul; Vol. 75 (1), pp. 162-172. Date of Electronic Publication: 2024 May 10.
DOI: 10.1016/j.jadohealth.2024.02.025
Abstrakt: Purpose: To examine the impact of About Us, an innovative healthy relationships intervention that promotes positive adolescent romantic relationships and the use of effective contraceptives, on improving behavior, attitudes, and intentions related to sexual intercourse, relationship communication, and conflict resolution at 3- and 9-month follow-up, compared to services as usual.
Methods: This was a multi-site, two-group, parallel, randomized-controlled trial with an intervention/comparison allocation ratio of 3:2 conducted at seven high schools in California between February 2018 and May 2021.
Results: Overall, our study did not find statistically significant evidence of improved behavior, attitudes, and intentions related to sexual intercourse, relationship communication, and conflict resolution among participants (14-18 years old) randomized to the intervention group (n = 316) compared to services as usual (n = 217) during follow-up (group x time; p > .05). Exploratory within group analyses showed that, compared to baseline, at the 3-month follow-up, the prevalence of reporting having had sex increased in the control group relative to intervention group (+19% vs. +9%, p < .01). Our sub-group analyses showed that changes in condom use intentions scores differed across school sites (group x time x school; p < .01); mixed (positive and negative) trends were observed for intervention effect, and schools with positive intervention effect trends tended to have greater program participation.
Discussion: About Us did not show statistically significant positive impacts on primary or secondary outcomes as anticipated. Our exploratory findings show evidence of some promising trends of intervention effects at the school-level, suggesting a need for better tailored intervention components and/or delivery to address the unique environmental contexts of participants. Overall, the context of study implementation was negatively affected by the COVID-19 pandemic and challenges related to using a non-classroom delivery intervention approach. Combined, these factors may have contributed to the study null findings. Moreover, it is difficult to know (or determine) the intervention's impact under more ideal conditions (i.e., no COVID pandemic).
(Copyright © 2024 Society for Adolescent Health and Medicine. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.)
Databáze: MEDLINE
Externí odkaz: