An Online Drug Abuse Prevention Program for Adolescent Girls: Posttest and 1-Year Outcomes

Area of Science:

• Psychology
• Public Health
• Adolescent Development

Background:

• Early adolescent girls exhibit drug use rates comparable to or exceeding boys.
• Girls face unique gender-specific risk factors for substance abuse.
• There is a need for targeted drug abuse prevention programs for adolescent girls.

Purpose of the Study:

• To develop and evaluate a web-based, gender-specific drug abuse prevention program for adolescent girls.
• To assess the program's impact on drug use, risk factors, and protective skills.
• To determine the program's effectiveness immediately after intervention and at 1-year follow-up.

Main Methods:

• A nationwide sample of 788 13- and 14-year-old girls was recruited via Facebook.
• Participants were randomly assigned to a 9-session online intervention or a control group.
• Data were collected online at pretest, posttest, and 1-year follow-up.

Main Results:

• Intervention participants showed reduced cigarette smoking and higher self-esteem, goal setting, media literacy, and self-efficacy at posttest.
• At 1-year follow-up, intervention participants reported less binge drinking and cigarette smoking.
• The intervention group also demonstrated improved refusal skills, coping skills, media literacy, and lower rates of peer drug use.

Conclusions:

• Tailored, online drug abuse prevention programs are effective for early adolescent girls.
• The program successfully enhanced cognitive and behavioral skills to mitigate drug use.
• Findings support the scalability and utility of digital health interventions for adolescent substance abuse prevention.