GLOSSARY

Archival data. Pre-existing information, generally collected by regional or State governments, regarding various social indicators that can help to determine community risk and protective factors, identify community resources, and determine community readiness for prevention efforts. See primary research and social indicators.

Community readiness. People’s beliefs, attitudes, and intentions regarding the extent to which changes are needed and their perceptions of individual and organizational capacity to successfully make those changes. Readiness is a state of mind about the need for an innovation and the capacity to change. It is the cognitive precursor to behaviors or either resistance or support for the efforts to change. Readiness can be thought of as the first part of the natural cycle of change. Importantly, readiness for change can be assessed or measured and prevention interventions can be designed based on these assessments.

Comparison group. A group of research study participants not exposed to the intervention. The term denotes that the method of assigning participants to condition (such as intervention or nonintervention group) was a method other than random assignment, although the participants in both conditions may have been similar in many respects. See control group.

Control group. A group of research study participants that is essentially similar to the intervention group but is not exposed to the intervention. The term denotes that the method of assigning participants to condition (such as intervention or nonintervention group) was by random assignment. See comparison group.

Environmental approaches. Environmental approaches to substance abuse prevention involve changing community, social, school, and family norms and laws which promote and maintain substance use. Environmental approaches are used to change the legal and social environment in which people buy and use alcohol and tobacco and other drugs throughout the community, where and when they use these products, and, in the case of alcohol, what they do after they drink. These interventions are designed to target risk factors in the community including social norms tolerant of substance use, policies enabling youth access and use, and lack of enforcement of laws designed to prevent substance use. These approaches involve establishing or changing written and unwritten community standards, codes, laws, policies, and attitudes, thereby influencing incidence and prevalence of substance abuse in the general population.

Examples of environmental approaches include strengthening the enforcement of existing legal regulations of alcohol and tobacco sales to youth; changing community social policies to strengthen regulations of alcohol and tobacco sales to youth; educating merchants and servers about alcohol and tobacco sales laws; using social marketing techniques and the media to increase social disapproval of alcohol and tobacco sales to minors; using social marketing techniques to increase social disapproval of substance use; using social marketing techniques and the media to increase awareness of community norms regarding substance use; using media advocacy to change the way the media reports information about substance abuse issues; and using media advocacy to develop support in the community for stronger substance-related regulations and ordinances.

Formative evaluations. Assessments used to modify or improve products, programs, or activities, and are based on feedback obtained during their planning and development. They seek to strengthen or improve the object being evaluated. They help form it by examining the delivery of the program or technology, the quality of its implementation, and the assessment of the organizational context, personnel, procedures, inputs, and related issues. See impact evaluations, outcome evaluations, and process evaluations.

Impact evaluations. Assessments which seek to determine whether a behavior or policy change has affected the overall extent or severity of the problem being addressed. For example, an environmental approach to underage drinking may have been designed to pass a new community law or regulation that strengthens enforcement of underage drinking. An impact evaluation seeks to determine whether passing the law and the subsequent greater enforcement of underage drinking laws results in a decrease in underage drinking. Also, impact evaluations can be used to determine whether the prevention effort was ultimately in line with the program’s mission statement. See formative evaluations, outcome evaluations, and process evaluations.

Intervention. A manipulation (such as a substance abuse prevention program or campaign) exposed to a population in order to change knowledge, attitudes, beliefs, or behaviors. In substance abuse prevention, interventions at the individual or policy level may be used to prevent or lower the rate of substance use or related problems.

Mission statement. Describes a group’s statement of purpose. It describes what it is going to do and why. It describes the special task and the motivation of participants. A mission statement should describe what will be accomplished and why. It is typically concise, such as one sentence. It is typically outcome-oriented, stating a broad goal or goals that will be achieved. It is typically inclusive of the kinds of strategies and community sectors that will be used to reach each goal. It should be sufficiently general and flexible to adapt to changing times, communities, needs, and membership.

Outcome evaluations. Assessments conducted to describe and document the extent to which the objectives of the prevention project have been accomplished. Said another way, outcome evaluations are assessments that focus research questions on assessing intervention effects on the intended outcomes. Since outcome evaluation typically involves comparing certain measures before the prevention effort and after the effort, the plan for an outcome evaluation begins during the assessment stage of project development. See formative evaluations, impact evaluations, and process evaluations.

Primary research. Conducting original research to obtain various social indicators that can help to determine community risk and protective factors, identify community resources, and determine community readiness for prevention efforts. Primary research can involve researching community laws or surveys to determine attitudes, norms, or gaps in social services. See archival data and social indicators.

Process evaluations. Assessments designed to document and explain the dynamics of a new or continuing prevention program; assessments that focus research questions on the nature of intervention implementation or its structure and operations. Broadly, process evaluations describe what happened as a program was started, implemented, and completed. A process evaluation is, by definition, descriptive and ongoing. It may be used to the degree to which prevention program procedures were conducted according to a written program plan. See formative evaluations, impact, and outcome evaluations.

Protective factors. Characteristics or situations that may decrease the likelihood of substance abuse problems for an individual, group, or a community. Community-level protective factors refer to social indicators that are associated with a decrease in substance abuse problems, such as laws and norms that restrict access to substances of abuse, laws and norms that support not using substances of abuse, access to housing and social services, access to employment and job training, and youth involvement in community service. See risk factors.

Random assignment. The process through which members of a pool of eligible study participants are assigned to either the intervention group or a control group on a random basis, such as through the use of a table of random numbers.

Risk factors. Characteristics or situations that may increase the likelihood of substance abuse problems for an individual, group, or a community. Community-level risk factors refer to social indicators that are associated with an increase in substance abuse problems, such as easy availability of substances of abuse, local laws and norms favorable to substance use, high rates of neighborhood transition, low rates of neighborhood attachment, economic and social deprivation, few employment opportunities, and few opportunities for youth community involvement. See protective factors.

Social indicators. Statistical data on such topics as the rates of unemployment, people receiving social services, people in treatment, children living in foster care, homicide, alcohol-related arrests, drug-related arrests, and property crimes. Examining social indicators provides a basis for analyzing risk and protective factors within a region. See archival data and primary research.

Stakeholders. People who are willing to spend time, energy, and possibly money to work together on a specific problem. They include people whose lives are directly affected by the problem, decision- and policy-makers who have strong feelings about the problem, and individuals who are willing to lend their skills or name to a cause.

Variable. A factor or characteristic of an intervention, participants, or context that may influence or be related to the possibility of achieving intermediate and long-term outcomes