Protecting Allies in Risky Situations

NCT ID: NCT04691492

Last Updated: 2024-11-14

Basic Information

• Recruitment Status: COMPLETED
• Clinical Phase: NA
• Total Enrollment: 108 participants
• Study Classification: INTERVENTIONAL
• Study Start Date: 2021-07-15
• Study Completion Date: 2022-09-16

Brief Summary

The current project will provide testing of a friend-based motivational interview (FMI) designed to reduce sexual assault risk. The study will address if the intervention minimizes the impact of alcohol on helping behavior, test whether drinking reduces intervention efficacy, and examine potential iatrogenic effects of the intervention.

Detailed Description

The objective of the proposed study is to develop an innovative, friend-based motivational interview (FMI) that encourages and prepares friends to reduce sexual assault (SA) risk. Delivered to pairs of friends (dyads), the FMI will be designed to foster collaborative efforts to increase readiness for, and decrease barriers to helping behavior, and to teach and plan together for assault prevention skills. As the role of alcohol has been under-addressed in SA prevention efforts, the FMI also will explicitly attend to how intoxication may serve as a barrier to friend intervention, and strategies for overcoming this barrier. The completion of this project's aims will yield a novel intervention that capitalizes on the natural resource of women's friendships to decrease risk for sexual assault - a pervasive public health problem affecting a substantial portion of young adult women in the U.S.

Twenty-four friend dyads will participate in the friend-based motivational interview (FMI) along with 24 wait-list control dyads (total of 48 dyads). The study will compare groups on outcomes at post-intervention and at bi-weekly 3 month follow-ups, and also examine within participant change. The study will focus on whether effects are in the expected direction and whether the strength of effect sizes are of practical magnitude. It is expected that participants receiving the FMI will demonstrate significant increases in readiness, and engagement in friend assault prevention behavioral skills (FAPBs), and demonstrate decreases in perceived barriers, at post-intervention and over the 3-month follow-up. Follow-up data will be utilized to provide a rich description of the role of alcohol in implementing FAPBs, and whether the FMI reduces the impact of alcohol use. In exploratory analyses, it will be examined whether the intervention may be associated with decreased assault risk, as well as decreased drinking.

Conditions

Sexual Assault; College Drinking; Behavioral Changes

Study Design

• Allocation Method: RANDOMIZED
• Intervention Model: PARALLEL
• Primary Study Purpose: PREVENTION
• Blinding Strategy: NONE

Study Groups

Friends-Based Motivational Interview (FMI) Group

Will participate in the Friends-Based Motivational Interview (FMI) program.

Group Type: EXPERIMENTAL

Friend-Based Motivational Interview

Intervention Type: BEHAVIORAL

The intervention will use Motivational Interviewing's (MI) collaborative conversation style for strengthening commitment to change, to motivate and prepare women to work together to reduce Sexual Assault (SA) risk. This intervention will target ways that the friend dyad may support, encourage, and share responsibility with one another in protecting against SA. The Friend-based MI (FMI) will then use the responsibility and relationship of friends as a framework to foster collaborative efforts to increase readiness and decrease barriers to helping behavior. As part of this, the FMI will focus on the identification and implementation of skills friends can use to help one another prevent sexual assault. FMI will include a focused discussion of the ways drinking may impede helping efforts. Moreover, the FMI will encourage women to identify personal, specific strategies for reducing the effects of alcohol on helping.

Wait List Control

The Wait List Control group will also be offered to participate in the Friends-Based Motivational Interview Program but at a deferred date (12 weeks later).

Group Type: NO_INTERVENTION

No interventions assigned to this group

Interventions

Friend-Based Motivational Interview

The intervention will use Motivational Interviewing's (MI) collaborative conversation style for strengthening commitment to change, to motivate and prepare women to work together to reduce Sexual Assault (SA) risk. This intervention will target ways that the friend dyad may support, encourage, and share responsibility with one another in protecting against SA. The Friend-based MI (FMI) will then use the responsibility and relationship of friends as a framework to foster collaborative efforts to increase readiness and decrease barriers to helping behavior. As part of this, the FMI will focus on the identification and implementation of skills friends can use to help one another prevent sexual assault. FMI will include a focused discussion of the ways drinking may impede helping efforts. Moreover, the FMI will encourage women to identify personal, specific strategies for reducing the effects of alcohol on helping.

Intervention Type: BEHAVIORAL

Eligibility Criteria

Inclusion Criteria

• Female dyads who go out together at least once a week
• Undergraduates enrolled in a 4-year college or university
• Meet heavy episodic drinking (HED) criteria, 4 or more drinks in a single sitting, 2 or more times monthly

Exclusion Criteria

Not Applicable

• Minimum Eligible Age: 18 Years
• Maximum Eligible Age: 24 Years
• Eligible Sex: FEMALE
• Accepts Healthy Volunteers: Yes

Sponsors

National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism (NIAAA)

NIH

Sponsor Role: collaborator

State University of New York at Buffalo

OTHER

Sponsor Role: lead

Responsible Party

Jennifer Read

Principal Investigator

Responsibility Role: PRINCIPAL_INVESTIGATOR

Principal Investigators

Jennifer P Read, Ph.D.

Role: PRINCIPAL_INVESTIGATOR

University at Buffalo

Locations

University at Buffalo Department of Psychology

Buffalo, New York, United States

Countries

United States

References

Read JP, Livingston JA, Shaw RJ, Wiseblatt AF, Jenzer T, DiPaolo LR, Mastroleo NR, Katz J, Testa M, Colder CR. The power of friends in reducing sexual assault risk in college women: A preliminary test of dyad-based motivational intervention approach. J Consult Clin Psychol. 2024 Dec;92(12):814-827. doi: 10.1037/ccp0000925.

Reference Type: DERIVED

PMID: 39715424 (View on PubMed)

Provided Documents

Document Type: Study Protocol and Statistical Analysis Plan

View Document

Other Identifiers

R34AA027046

Identifier Type: NIH

Identifier Source: secondary_id

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R34AA027046

Identifier Type: NIH

Identifier Source: org_study_id

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