Many prevention instruments address only middle and high school youth. The Prevention Impact Index, developed/validated in Texas Schools, was refined/jury validated. Adaptation: question reduction from 186 to 25, langugage simplification, and response format changes. The instrument was administered to 156 5th grade students, 46%African-Americans; 50%, males; & 66.7% lived with both parents. Results: Individual: Students repeating a grade (24.4%); enjoying risk taking behavior (49.4%); or had low self-esteem (56.4%). Youth could not say no to smoking a cigarette (21%) or taking a sip of alcohol (23%). Family: Almost one in four children do not watch TV with their parents and 16% do not eat dinner most nights with their parents. 76.3% attended church once or twice a week. School: One is four students had repeated a grade (24%), most planned to graduate from high school (96.8%), felt that help was available to them at school (87.8%), and could talk to their teachers(87.2%). Friends: During the past 30 days, 16% stole from someone, 4.5% set fire to someone’s property, and 19.2% damaged school property. Survey results indicated: resistance to negative peer influences and smoking were about the same for respondents whether they lived with one parent or two, but children living with one parent were four times likely to say that their friends stole from someone. Further, males were found to be twice as like to smoke and to report having friends that stole as females. Finally, children who attend church more often reported about two and a half times less smoking.
Learning Objectives: At the conclusions of the poster section, the learners will have demonstrated an increased in knowledge about rural fifth graders prevention perceptions/practices, per interactions with the facilitator.
Presenting author's disclosure statement:
Organization/institution whose products or services will be discussed: Madison Florida Schools
Disclosure not received
Relationship: Not Received.