Hot topic search results

You have found 51 entries after clicking the GO button or a search link in a hot topic. Starting with the most recently added or updated entries, the list shows in orange the type of entry, year the original document was published (or if one of our own documents, the year last updated), and the type of file you will download when you click on the title. In blue is the document’s title followed by a brief description.

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STUDY 2010 HTM file
Preventing drug abuse among adolescent girls: outcome data from an internet-based intervention

In this US study a substance use prevention programme for adolescent girls accessed over the internet from home had effects comparable to school-based drug education, yet occupied no classroom or teacher time and could inexpensively be replicated across the internet-linked population. Also described are later reports from similar studies.

STUDY 2018 HTM file
Alcohol prevention for school students: Results from a 1-year follow up of a cluster-randomised controlled trial of harm minimisation school drug education

Strong argument for harm reduction to be the basis of standard drug education within schools from this large-scale Australian trial. Alcohol-related findings 15 months after the two-year programme ended showed its residual effectiveness in reducing pupils’ alcohol consumption and related harm.

HOT TOPIC 2018 HTM file
Computerised therapies: sacrificing effectiveness for wider access?

‘Hot topics’ offer background and analysis on important issues which sometimes generate heated debate. Among culturally accepted vehicles for delivering substance use interventions, computers, mobile phones and tablets are joining face-to-face work. Are we sacrificing effectiveness for convenience and economy?

REVIEW 2015 HTM file
Single-session alcohol interventions for heavy drinking college students: A systematic review and meta-analysis

Personalised, interactive, and motivational approaches dominate in this study of the effectiveness of single-session brief interventions for heavy-drinking college students. But, overall the effects of brief interventions remain modest in clinical terms.

STUDY 2010 HTM file
Long-term effects of the Strong African American Families program on youths’ alcohol use

Five years later a parent-and-child alcohol use prevention programme developed for poor black families with 11-year-old children in the USA’s rural south was found to have retarded the growth in average drinking frequency. Results were consistently positive, but methodological issues limit confidence in the findings.

STUDY 2014 HTM file
Perceived peer drinking norms and responsible drinking in UK university settings

Exposure to messages about responsible drinking norms had little effect on drinking perceptions and no positive effect on drinking intentions among students in this UK university, echoing the disappointing findings of other British trials.

STUDY 2012 HTM file
Personalised normative feedback for preventing alcohol misuse in university students: Solomon three-group randomised controlled trial

Modern preventive interventions to reduce young people’s drinking rely heavily on correcting misperceptions that their peers drink more, but among 2611 students recruited from 122 UK universities, no reliable impacts were found, results in line with disappointing results from other studies.

HOT TOPIC 2016 HTM file
‘Everyone’s not doing it’ message offers hope for prevention

‘Hot topics’ offer background and analysis on important issues which sometimes generate heated debate. ‘Normative education’ comparing the recipient’s use levels to population norms retains some of its shine as the great hope for school- and college-based prevention, but accumulating data demands a reappraisal.

REVIEW 2015 HTM file
Prevention of addictive behaviours

Based largely on existing reviews, this report for the German Federal Centre for Health Education comprehensively assesses substance use prevention approaches. Among its many conclusions are that approaches based solely on information provision are ineffective, in contrast to the more positive evidence for lifeskills and multi-component community programmes.

STUDY 2015 HTM file
Improving social norms interventions: rank-framing increases excessive alcohol drinkers’ information-seeking

‘Social norm’ interventions which aim to reduce consumption by telling heavy drinkers how their drinking compares to their peer-group norm have a patchy record, but this British study suggests for students they might be improved by ranking against peers (eg, ‘You drink more than 80% of students’) rather than comparing how many units of alcohol they consume.

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