Development of persuasive messages to prevent prescription drug abuse among teens

Prescription drugs are the most commonly abused drug by seventh and eighth grade students. Like the use of other illicit drugs, prescription drug abuse can produce physical and psychological problems among teens. However, prescription drug abuse prevention entails unique challenges, because of their legitimate use to treat medical conditions, the normative influences of Direct-to-Consumer (DTC) prescription drug advertising, and the motivations for prescription drug use among teens that differ from other drugs. There is little systematic evidence about message delivery sources and points of intervention for effective prescription drug abuse prevention. This paper begins to fill this information gap.

The paper reports the results of several focus groups with seventh and eighth grade students held in Atlanta, Georgia in February of 2009. We use primary focus group data to describe how teens categorize the accuracy, persuasiveness, and prevalence of existing messages about prescription drugs from parents, peers, and other sources in their environment. The paper proposes a model of the characteristics of messages that are most likely to positively impact teens' behavior on prescription drug use. We hypothesize that messages vary significantly along three dimensions of delivery, including personal versus non-personal relationships, authoritative to non-authoritative tones, and interpersonal versus interactive modalities. The paper recommends how to compose, deliver, and test effective messages to curb teen prescription drug abuse. On the whole, the paper will improve the field's theoretical and practical understanding of how to overcome the unique challenges of prescription drug abuse among teens.