Social Ecology and the Prevention of Suicide and Aggression in African American Youth

Plain-language summary

The purpose of this study is to examine the efficacy of a culturally-grounded, school-based suicide and aggression preventive intervention for African American adolescents (Adapted-Coping with Stress Course \[A-CWS\]). The A-CWS is a 15-session, cognitive-behavioral group intervention designed to develop and enhance African American youths' skills for coping with stress. Emphasis is given to the identification of stress unique to the day-to-day experiences of the youths and options for reducing stress that are culturally consistent. A total of four public high schools in a large Midwestern metropolitan area participated in this study that used a randomized-controlled design, with randomization occurring at the individual level. Participants were randomized either to the A-CWS intervention condition, or to a standard care control condition. This study had three hypotheses: (1) The intervention would raise adaptive coping, relative to the standard care control condition; (2) coping skills would explain the effects of the A-CWS intervention on problematic outcomes (i.e., suicidality, aggression); and (3) socio-ecological factors (i.e., neighborhood and family characteristics) would influence the effect of the A-CWS intervention on coping skills, and the effect of coping skills on problematic outcomes.

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