The Iowa Strengthening Families Program
The Center for Family Research in Rural Mental Health at Iowa State University selected SFP for a clinical research trial targeting 10- to 14-year-old youth and their families in 19 economically disadvantaged counties in rural Iowa. SFP was modified to place greater emphasis on youth resiliency (Kumpfer, 1994b; Richardson et al., 1990). The modified program focused on protective factors associated with seven basic resiliency characteristics in youth (optimism, empathy, insight, intellectual competence, self-esteem, direction or purpose in life, and determination or perseverance) and seven coping or life skills (emotional management skills, interpersonal social skills, reflective skills, academic and job skills, ability to restore self-esteem, planning skills, and life skills and problem-solving abilities).
Thirty-three schools were selected on the basis of the high percentage of families participating in free or reduced-price school lunch programs. The true experimental design randomly assigned each school to one of three conditions: (1) Iowa Strengthening Families Program (ISFP), (2) Preparing for the Drug-Free Years (Hawkins, Catalano, and Miller, 1992), a five-session youth and family program; or (3) a minimal-contact control condition. Families in the control condition received four Cooperative Extension Service leaflets that provided information on the developmental changes of preteens and teens in physical, emotional, cognitive, and relational domains.
To facilitate universal implementation among families of all sixth graders, the number of sessions was reduced from 14 to 7. The standard SFP content and format were used, including separate parenting and youth sessions for the first hour and a family session for the second hour. A total of 161 families, including 114 families that completed an inhome pretest assessment, participated in 21 SFP groups at 11 different schools. Approximately 94 percent of pretested participants completed five or more sessions, 88 percent attended at least six sessions, and 62 percent attended all seven sessions.
Outcome evaluations included the use of multi-informant, multimethod measurement procedures at pretest, posttest, 1-year, 2-year, and 3-year followup data-collection points (Molgaard, Kumpfer, and Spoth, 1994). The assessment included inhome videotapes of families in structured family interaction tasks, inhome interviews, and standardized instrument measures.
Fidelity of program delivery was randomly monitored by trained research staff who attended two sessions each of youth and parent groups. These skilled researchers used detailed checklists to guide their observations and ratings of adherence to standardized SFP content and quality of leader delivery. Analysis of the pretest-posttest followup data showed significant changes and improvements in the parents' and children's behavior, knowledge, and skills. Most important, 3 years after the program ended, substance abuse among SFP youth was still significantly lower than that of the control group counterparts. Youth in the control group also consumed greater quantities of alcohol than youth in the ISFP group (Spoth, 1998).
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