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Assessing Needs, Building Strengths: Rethinking Prevention: · Professor Peterson’s Psychology Classroom

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Future of Thought is here.
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All right, here we go. Now,
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when, now, when we think about substance
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use prevention, we often immediately think about
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education. We might imagine going into
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a school and explaining the dangers of alcohol or drugs
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like we've talked about through throughout this course.
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We might develop some posters, organize presentations,
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and create activities intended to discourage substance use.
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And I want to make this point, there is nothing inherently
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wrong with those approaches.
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They can be incredibly useful, they can be helpful,
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but I want us to consider a question when we're looking
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especially at worksheet 2 and worksheet 3
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is how do we know that a program we're developing actually addresses
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the needs of a community?
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And perhaps an even more important question,
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who gets to decide what those needs are?
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Okay, so I want you to think about that for a moment and
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imagine an organization decides that teenagers in a
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particular community, I can't
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talk, needs some educational program about
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substance use. And so the organization
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develops a curriculum, hires a presenter,
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schedules some workshops, and we do some advertisement.
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Everything looks good from the outset.
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But imagine when the workshop begins, very few teenagers
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attend. Okay, and then what happens?
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We might be tempted to say that young people aren't interested,
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that their families don't care, or that the community doesn't
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recognize the problem in the first place.
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But I want you to remember that those explanations assume something
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about people before we've actually investigated the circumstances.
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Because, again, like we've talked about with this ecological
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perception— ecological model idea,
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is that it might be transportation issues,
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the workshops were scheduled when students had family responsibilities,
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perhaps presentation didn't reflect the concerns of
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some of the young people, or perhaps the community
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already had prevention resources, And what people
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really needed was a better access to them.
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And at the same level, it can be a combination of all
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of those things dependent upon the adolescent's
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experience and needs. And these are
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also very different explanations, and they would lead
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us towards a very different prevention strategy.
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That's really what the first worksheet,
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this worksheet 2, is really trying to get at,
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is the evidence and the ecological conditions.
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And that's why it's titled Assessing
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the Needs and Community Strengths.
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And I want you to notice that the worksheet asks
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for both needs and strengths.
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That distinction is important because when we begin
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a prevention program by focusing exclusively on problems,
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we can unintentionally create the picture of a community
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as deficient, struggling,
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incapable of addressing its own challenges.
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But as we have seen, I hope,
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Communities are never simply a collection of problems.
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They also contain knowledge, relationships, cultural traditions,
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institutions, informal support systems,
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and people who have been working in— to improve their communities
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long before we even came on the scene.
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So the first thing this worksheet asks you to do
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is to develop a a small evidence log.
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What I want you to do is you're going to identify at
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least 3 pieces of useful evidence.
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For each one, you'll identify the source, the date,
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the population, and the settings, and findings,
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and the limitations. Why include limitations?
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Your evidence— that Your evidence doesn't need to tell us everything.
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For example, imagine that we find that a statewide
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report is indicating that adolescent substance abuse is
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an important public health concern. That's useful information,
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but we can't automatically assume that the same pattern that
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exists in— that same pattern exists in every community within
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a large state. A statewide average may
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tell us very little about a particularly rural community or
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tribal communities, or even if we're focusing on a smaller
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unit of a neighborhood. And even when we
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know that substance use is occurring, we still need
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to understand the circumstances surrounding it.
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This is where that ecological perspective becomes especially
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valuable. Rather than assuming substance
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use results entirely from
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individual choices, we need to examine the different environments
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in which people live. Okay, so we might consider
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individual stress, peer relationships,
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family responsibilities, school environments,
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service availability, and broader community
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conditions. Our connected pathways
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example identifies several possible conditions: stress,
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peer cross-pressure, privacy concerns,
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transportation, and service abilities,
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okay. Now here is something I want you to pay attention
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to while you're going through this section.
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Probably should— these
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are possible influences, not establishing an explanation
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for every individual in that community or
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who we want to serve. We cannot assume that every
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young person experiences the same pressures in
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the teenage example.
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So kind of going with that adolescent idea is one student
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may be experiencing consider— considerable peer pressure,
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another may have a supportive peer group but difficulty
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accessing services. Another may be
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managing family responsibility that is interfering with participation
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in an after-school activity. The goal is to
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understand the relationships between people and their environment,
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rather than reducing a complicated social concern to
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one single explanation.
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And this brings us up to an important point about culture.
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Is that cultural identity should
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not automatically treat a group as a risk factor.
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If we discover differences in access or output across
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communities, we need to examine the structural,
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historical, relational, and environmental conditions that
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might explain those differences. Culture may also
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provide a power protective resource through relationships,
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shared responsibilities, and community knowledge and tradition.
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And this is where, you know, an important aspect of
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understanding culture is that we may
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look at certain cultures and say it's because of their
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culture that they're led to do these
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bad or counterproductive behaviors.
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But when we step back from that and look at
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it through the lens of, no, let's sit back and look at what are
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some structural and relational and environmental conditions,
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a lot of times we find that culture is
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one of those things that we could use as a protective factor.
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And not as a factor of causing issues
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within given communities. Our job is to investigate those
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possible possibilities respectfully
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and not assume them.
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Where are we? Okay.
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Trying to make sure I'm keeping up with the worksheet as I'm thinking through these.
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Okay, here we are. All right.
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So now let's turn our attention to the protective factors.
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A protective factor is something that may reduce vulnerability
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to a particular problem or help people respond
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more effectively when difficulties
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arise, okay. For substance use prevention,
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we might think about supportive relationships,
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opportunities for meaningful participation,
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and access to service, and environments where young, in our
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example using young people, feel they're respected and
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connected. In the Connected Pathways example,
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We identify trust— trusted adults,
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youth leaders, and opportunity as
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potential assets. But I
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want you to consider something when thinking about this, this part,
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is simply identifying an asset doesn't mean everyone can
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access it. Imagine a community that has an
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excellent youth membership program, And that's wonderful,
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but what if the program meets only in the evenings when some
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young people don't have transportation?
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What if some young people with care have caregiving responsibilities?
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And what, what if other people aren't comfortable participating
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because they worry about confidentiality or whether
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they'll belong? The program exists,
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but access may be unequal.
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This is where this worksheet asks you to consider
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unequal exposure and access to whatever
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program you're trying to develop. And we
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need to distinguish between a resource being available
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and a resource being realistically accessible.
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And I think this is in part really important when we consider
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rural and our tribal communities. For example, a service
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may be technically available within a geographical region,
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and I know we've talked about this in some of our examples we have,
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such as the dance idea and the exercise idea,
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but if it requires considerable travel,
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And also, a program may be well-funded but lack
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the trusted relationships necessary for people to feel comfortable
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to participate. So in this area,
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we can have 2 kind of competing things. In one
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end, it may be a travel issue
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because it's a large regional area,
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but on the other end, even if that program is very well-funded,
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If that trust hasn't been built with that
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community, it's going to be very difficult
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to— for people to engage in it.
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Of course, there are possibilities to investigate.
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Not characteristics should assume apply to every rural
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or tribal community. And this is where I want you to dig into the
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area that you're planning on serving. From the completion
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of worksheet 1. So let me just give another
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example. Suppose a prevention organization wants to increase CREECE
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participation, but it discovers that a
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community already has a respected elder,
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cultural educator, and youth leader that provides guidance and
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membership. And so in this case,
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Rather than immediately developing a complete new mentoring structure,
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the organization might explore whether those existing
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relationships could support that prevention effort.
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But we would first need to ask those individuals whether
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they wanted to participate, what role they believe would be appropriate,
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and the resources or boundaries they would need.
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The important lesson is that community strength
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should influence program design, not simply appear
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in the introduction of your proposal. It should go throughout
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the entire proposal.
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So, in Part 4 of the worksheet,
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this is where we decide what we can realistically
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address. One of the most important
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challenges or challenging aspects of prevention planning is recognizing
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what we cannot address. We might
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identify, for example, transportation, family stress,
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peer pressure, limited access to services,
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and insufficient recreational opportunities.
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All of these could be important,
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but that does not mean that our program
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should attempt to address all 5 and probably won't.
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And so for a small prevention program, we have to understand
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our limitations in time, funding,
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staffing, and authority. And so
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this worksheet asks us to identify 2 or 3 conditions that
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are both important and realistically for you to modify.
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So let's reconnect, let's reconnect to that connected pathways
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idea. Suppose your assessment suggests
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that your population that you wanna work with would benefit from
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greater access to trusted adults or elders.
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And meaningful opportunities to develop leadership skills
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in their youth, for example.
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So, it might be reasonable to first do what's
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called a pilot program. And so,
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but in this pilot program, you might want to— you might
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think back and go, well, but we identified transportation as a
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limitation. Um, that is
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important for access. Perhaps the program can
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reduce the barriers by choosing accessible meeting locations
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or Zoom or alternative
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part— I can't
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talk again— participation formats.
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All right, however, creating an entirely
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new community transportation system would probably fall
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out this outside the scope of our small prevention
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project. So again,
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recognizing the limitations doesn't mean we're ignoring
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the problems. It means we're making responsible
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decisions about what the program can actually accomplish.
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And there's one other important component of this worksheet that
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I want you to look at, and that's Identifying,
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identifying those,
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identifying— I just lost my train of thought. Let me look at the worksheet.
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Okay, identifying whose perspectives are missing.
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Maybe we'll review it, reviewed a report from
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a public health agency, school, or service provider,
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but have We heard from,
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for example, our population themselves. Have we connected
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with them? Have we considered caregivers,
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community members who don't regularly participate with
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formal organizations,
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people who have encountered barriers to existing
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services, and have we really done the analysis to
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look at those? Because when we only consult the
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professionals, we risk developing a professional
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understanding of a problem without adequately addressing the lived
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experience of the people that are being affected by that issue.
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So your worksheet asks for you to develop 2 respectful
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questions that could help address
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those gaps. Notice that you're planning how to learn
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from people. You're not being asked to conduct
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unauthorized interviews or collect sensitive information.
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So at the end of Worksheet 2,
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let me get to the end here,
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you'll write needs and strength statements
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that bring all of these things together. You should be
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able to explain the concerns, the evidence supporting it,
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the conditions you want to address, and the community
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strengths that you can build on, and what
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remains uncertain. And that statements become
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a foundation of your next worksheet.
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But again, on this worksheet, for some of you,
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I know that you're actually seriously building a program,
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so I would expect you to really drill down
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on these questions. But I also know that in some
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cases this is kind of a, uh,
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what we call a thought research,
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so I'd want you to kind of consider what you would need to look at,
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okay?