Project MADD was designed to attempt to curb the alarming trends related to drunk driving and to move the field forward by testing a brief parent-intervention's ability to change adolescents' drinking, impaired driving, and riding with impaired driver behaviors. The aim of this project is to provide an easy-to-implement and low-cost alternative parent-based intervention that can be widely disseminated to address this important public health problem.
Drunk driving is a major public health problem. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration reported nearly 10,000 people died in alcohol-related crashes in the U.S. in 2014. The problem is further magnified when one considers that each year over 1.3 million drivers in the U.S. are arrested for alcohol-impaired driving. As alarming as these statistics are they pale by comparison to estimates indicating that they only represent 1% of the 121 million self-reported episodes of alcohol-impaired driving among U.S. drivers each year. The proposed research will attempt to curb these alarming trends and move the field forward by conducting a randomized controlled trial testing a brief parent intervention's ability to change adolescents' drinking, impaired driving, and riding with impaired driver behaviors. Prior brief parent-based interventions fro this lab have provided sufficient preliminary evidence of participation, communication, and efficacy for changing under-age drinking to warrant a large-scale comprehensive study. The study will use an extremely rigorous design that meets the Society for Prevention Research Criteria for Efficacy as described in Flay et al., a nationally representative sample assessed at 3-waves (baseline, 6 mo. and 12 mo.) to examine generalizability and sustained effects, and an oversampled Hispanic/Latino subgroup to examine the parent-intervention's potential to reduce a health disparity in an underserved population. The aims are as follows: Aim 1: Evaluate the efficacy of the parent intervention (short and long term); Aim 2: Examine mediators of the PBI that directly influence drinking, impaired driving, and riding with impaired driver behaviors; and Aim 3: Identify moderators to help inform future tailoring and improvement in intervention effectiveness. To the extent that the research is successful, it will provide an easy to implement and low cost alternative that can be widely disseminated to address this important public health problem.
Study Type
INTERVENTIONAL
Allocation
RANDOMIZED
Purpose
PREVENTION
Masking
SINGLE
Enrollment
2,352
Handbook developed by MADD and the PI to guide parents in discussing underage drinking, behaviors, and consequences with their teens
Information published by the Surgeon General about teens and drinking
Penn State University
University Park, Pennsylvania, United States
Typical Weekend Drinking (DDQ)
Typical weekend drinking was assessed using the Daily Drinking Questionnaire (DDQ; Collins et al., 1985), which asked teens to indicate the number of drinks they consumed on a typical Friday and Saturday during the past 6 months. These two items were summed to create the number of typical weekend drinks. Higher scores indicate the teen consumed a higher number of drinks on a typical weekend.
Time frame: Baseline, 6 month follow-up, and 12 month follow-up
Declining to Ride With Impaired Drivers
Declining riding with impaired drivers was assessed with two items adapted from Hultgren et al (2018). Teens were asked to indicate the number of times they declined a ride from a driver that consumed alcohol and the number of times they declined a ride from a driver that consumed any drug other than alcohol (e.g., marijuana, opioids) in the past 6 months. Responses were summed to indicate the number of times they declined rides from impaired drivers in the past 6 months. Higher scores indicate the participant declined more rides from impaired drivers.
Time frame: T4 (12-months post-baseline)
Willingness to Ride in a Car With an Impaired Driver
Willingness to ride in a car with an impaired driver was assessed with two items adapted from Hultgren et al. (2018). Teens responded using a 7-point scale that ranged from (0) Strongly disagree to (6) Strongly agree on their level of agreement to the following statements, "I am willing to be a passenger in a vehicle when the driver has consumed alcohol." and "I am willing to be a passenger in a vehicle when the driver has consumed any drug other than alcohol (e.g., marijuana, ecstasy, opioids).". Responses were averaged to create a mean score. Higher scores indicate the participant is more willing to be a passenger in a car with an impaired driver.
Time frame: Baseline, 6 month follow-up, and 12 month follow-up
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