Substance-abuse prevention: Beyond the schoolyard

Substance-abuse prevention in children and youth has had limited success, possibly because the scope of traditional interventions, usually school based, is too narrow. Children who live in poverty and/or whose homes are dysfunctional need environmental changes beyond what traditional school-based programs can offer. Community psychologists need to expand their work in this area. School-based and community-based interventions are addressed. Ideas for broadening interventions to include elements such as family, media, and community collaboration are evaluated and discussed, along with successful examples of such interventions. Suggestions are made for further innovative work in this area.     

The Neighbourhood Youth Inventory: development and validation

This paper describes the development and validation of an inventory to uncover youths' experiences in their neighbourhoods. The Neighbourhood Youth Inventory (NYI) was developed from conversations with youths in Grades 7, 9 and 11. This paper reports the psychometric analyses of the NYI. Responses from 934 youths (511 urban, 423 rural) to the NYI resulted in a four‐factor solution. This solution was stable across responses from youths in Grades 7, 9 and 11, and for urban and rural youths. Cronbach alphas ranged from 0.64 to 0.94. Construct, convergent and discriminant validity of the NYI subscales are demonstrated. Using the NYI we will be able to assess youths' experiences within their neighbourhoods, which may contribute to a more ecological understanding of healthy developmental outcomes beyond family, peer and school environments. Copyright © 1999 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Use of a paired-stimulus demand analysis to evaluate demands for inclusion in functional analyses

Clinicians regularly use both indirect and direct assessments to identify preferred stimuli to include in control conditions and positive reinforcement test conditions in a functional analysis (FA). However, clinicians often rely on indirect assessment alone (e.g., caregiver report) to identify aversive stimuli to include in negative reinforcement test conditions. In this study, we evaluate a paired-stimulus demand analysis and validate assessment results via FA. Results indicate that, for all 4 participants, the demands selected least often evoked higher rates of destructive behavior than more frequently selected demands. We identified an escape function for all 4 participants in the escape–least selected (LS) condition (true positive finding) and for only 1 participant in the escape–most selected (MS) condition (false negative finding for 3 of 4 participants). These results support the utility of empirically deriving stimuli for inclusion in the negative reinforcement test condition of an FA to decrease the likelihood of false negative findings.     

The good of today depends not on the good of tomorrow: a constraint on theories of well-being

Philosophical Studies - This article addresses three questions about well-being. First, is well-being future-sensitive? I.e., can present well-being depend on future events? Second, is well-being...     

Common Brain Structural Alterations Associated with Cardiovascular Disease Risk Factors and Alzheimer’s Dementia: Future Directions and Implications

Neuropsychology Review - Recent reports suggest declines in the age-specific risk of Alzheimer’s dementia in higher income Western countries. At the same time, investigators believe that...     

Stages of readiness to quit smoking: population prevalence and correlates.

We examined the population prevalence and correlates of stages in smokers' readiness to quit, using data from 1,048 smokers recruited in a self-weighting, multistage, systematic clustered area sample from 0.44% of South Australian dwellings, with an 89% response rate. Smokers in the precontemplation stage comprised 24.1% of the sample, smokers in the contemplation stage comprised 47.2%, and smokers in the preparation stage comprised 28.7%. No sociodemographic variables (i.e., age, sex, marital status, educational level) were found to be significant independent predictors of membership in the different stages. The five significant independent predictors of being in the precontemplation stage (vs. the contemplation stage) were (a) having a higher confidence of quitting, (b) seeing fewer health risks associated with smoking, (c) not having made an attempt to quit, (d) seeing quitting as more difficult, and (e) smoking 25 or more cigarettes a day. The two significant independent predictors of being in the contemplation stage (vs. the preparation stage) were (a) having lower confidence of quitting and (b) not having tried to quit. We discuss implications for the understanding of smoking behavior in populations and also consider how cessation campaigns might address the factors associated with different stages of readiness to quit.