Grant Number:	1R03CA115306-01A1 Interpret this number
Primary Investigator:	Sindelar, Holly
Organization:	Brown University
Project Title:	Developing an Expectancy Challenge for Diverse Teens
Fiscal Year:	2005

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): Cross-sectional and longitudinal investigations of smoking outcome expectancies over the last 15 years have established strong associations between expectancies and smoking initiation, smoking behavior and cessation, and risk factors for smoking uptake among adolescents. Recently, researchers have developed an innovative approach, an expectancy challenge, to modify outcome expectancies in order to prevent initiation of alcohol use among children and to decrease cigarette and alcohol use among adults. No published data yet exist on an expectancy challenge administered to adolescents to modify smoking outcome expectancies. Research has also demonstrated that although the prevalence of cigarette use is low for ethnic and racial minorities relative to non-Hispanic Caucasians during adolescence, prevalence rates increase most substantially among minority groups after age 18. Therefore, development of innovative smoking prevention approaches for ethnic and racial minorities are necessary. To that end, the primary aim of this small grant application is to modify an expectancy challenge such that it can be delivered to address smoking outcome expectancies among an ethnically and racially diverse population of young adolescents. In this mixed methods design, 128 non-Hispanic Caucasian, non-Hispanic African American, Hispanic, and Asian adolescents (age 12-14) will participate in a total of 16 focus groups. Data from the focus groups and self-report instruments will be used to develop a smoking expectancy challenge designed to be administered to ethnically and racially diverse young adolescents. The results of this project will facilitate a subsequent investigation of the efficacy of a smoking expectancy challenge in modifying smoking outcome expectancies among ethnically and racially diverse adolescents. The long-term goal of this line of research is to develop innovative smoking prevention and intervention approaches for adolescents. The research is relevant to public health in that it can make an important contribution to the decline of smoking among adolescents and therefore decrease smoking-related morbidity and mortality.





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