Motivating Actions for Prevention (MAP): A Multimedia Web-Based Preventive Intervention for Parents of Youth At Risk for Marijuana Abuse

In the United Statescannabis products are now legally available for adult medical use instates and the District of ColumbiaDespite strict laws and federal and state initiatives to prevent cannabis distribution to and access among youththe trends toward legalization and relaxed social norms have led to concerns over increasing adolescent useAdolescent marijuana use has been associated with massive costs to society and linked to myriad negative health and legal consequencesschool problems and lower income in adulthoodsubsequent illegal drug use and drug dependenceand decreased cognitive functioningwith early onset marijuana users showing worse performance on cognitive tasksThis pressing problem has led statesinstitutionsand organizations to adopt regulatory policies and practices aimed to prevent adolescent marijuana usebut with questionable successA major pathway for youth at risk for marijuana use to receive services is through state family and juvenile services programs and juvenile courtsDespite the development of evidencebased prevention practices for youth substance useno marijuana specific parent based interventions have been developed for the current legalized marijuana environments that now challenge families in new and unique waysMore criticallyjuvenile court judges and JJS staff responsible for serviceslack user friendlytechnology basedcost efficient resources to address the needs of families at risk for marijuana abuseThis Phase I SBIR research aims to address this urgent issue by developing a web based early intervention prototypeMotivating Actions for PreventionMAPfor adolescent marijuana use for parents of at risk youth involved in juvenile justice and child and family services programsMAP will be formulated as a brief motivational approach with educational and skill building components to address marijuana effects and misconceptionssafety and securityparentadolescent communicationand other strategies to reduce youth exposure to risky conditions and foster resilience through family cohesionpositive modelingand effective copingThe study aims are toConduct focus groups withparents to guide the development of MAP contentstructure and delivery methodsintegrating the formative feedback within the iterative development of the initial web based prototypeCreate and evaluate an Alpha prototype and materials for the MAP interventionincluding the online framework that contains the basic essential elements of textgraphicsand interactive featuresConduct a pilot test of a Beta prototype for the MAP intervention with an independent pilot sample ofparents of youth at risk for marijuana abuseincluding parents with current medical marijuana use and parents of youth referred by law enforcement to the JJSto examine functionalitye gtechnical errorsand feasibilitye gpercent completionsThe Phase I research is designed to yield an innovative prevention product that can be scaled to meet the growing demand among juvenile court judgesJJS staffand others responsible for state and community prevention programming for effectivelow costwidely accessible resource for states with legalized marijuana In the majority of the United States where medical marijuana sales are now legalparents of youth involved in state programs serving youth and families such as the Juvenile Justice System and ChildYouthand Families Departments face new challenges in deterring adolescent marijuana abuseAlthough parents can have a powerful influence in preventing youth marijuana usetheir increasingly permissive attitudes toward marijuana use has been linked to increased use among their offspringThe proposed research involves the development and pilot testing of a theory guidedempirically basedand user friendly web based intervention designed to help parents reduce youth exposure and access to marijuana and foster resilience through strengthened family relationshipsparentingand effective communications supportive of adolescent marijuana abstinence