Guide to Effective Programs
for Children and Youth

The Aban Aya Youth Project: Reducing Violence Among

African American Adolescent Males

OVERVIEW

The Aban Aya Youth Project (AAYP), the name of which reflect the Ghanaian term for “protection and self-determination,” is a program designed to reduce rates of risky behaviors among African-American children in 5^th through 8^th grades. In an evaluation conducted by AAYP and other researchers, 12 schools were randomly assigned to one of three conditions – a classroom curriculum, curriculum plus school and community-level interventions, or a control group that received a health-oriented intervention. The study found no impacts for girls. For boys, the school/community intervention resulted in significant impacts for all outcomes, including self-reported violence, provoking behavior, school delinquency, substance use, sexual activity, and condom use. Similar but statistically marginal impacts were found for boys in the schools that received only the classroom curriculum. Additional analyses examining subgroup differences found that, compared with the control group, boys in the combined school/community and classroom-curriculum-only groups reported less violent behavior, and a reduction in the rate of growth of violent behavior.

DESCRIPTION OF PROGRAM

Target population: African-American students in metropolitan schools at high-risk for violence

The Aban Aya Youth Project (AAYP) was developed to compare three curricula designed to reduce the rate of growth of violence among African-American adolescent boys from grades 5 through 8.

The social development curriculum focuses on reducing risky behaviors, such as violence, substance abuse, and unsafe sexual practices. The program teaches cognitive-behavioral skills, in order to build self-esteem and empathy, manage stress and anxiety, develop interpersonal relationships, resist peer pressure, and develop decision-making, problem-solving, conflict resolution, and goal-setting skills. The curriculum consists of 16 to 21 lessons per year from 5^th through 8^th grade. Child-parent communication is promoted through the parental support element of the program, which provides training for parents. Linkages between parents, schools, and local businesses were formed.

The school/community intervention includes the social development curriculum, plus parental support and school climate and community components. Each participating school forms a local task force, consisting of school representatives, students, parents, community members, and project staff, which proposes changes in school policy, develops school-community collaborations, and conducts program activities.

The health enhancement curriculum serves as the control condition and includes the same number of lessons as are in the social development curriculum. The curriculum focuses on promoting healthy behaviors related to nutrition, physical activity, health care, cultural pride, and communalism. All interventions are taught by trained university-based health educators.

Training is available for $1,500 for a one-day session. Technical support is available for trainees at $100/hour.

EVALUATION(S) OF PROGRAM

Study 1

Flay, B. R., Graumlich, S, Segawa, E., Burns, J. L., Holliday, M. Y. (2004). Effects of 2 prevention programs on high-risk behaviors among African American Youth. Archives of Pediatrics and Adolescent Medicine, 158(4), 377-384.

Evaluated population: Twelve poor, African-American metropolitan Chicago schools with greater than 80 percent African-American, and less than 10 percent Latino enrollment, participated in the study. Other school criteria included housing grades kindergarten through 8, total enrollment greater than 500, and a student turnover rate of less than 50 percent per year. From the 12 schools, 552 5^th graders were recruited in 1994-1995 and were followed until grade 8. The students were 49.5 percent male, and averaged 10.8 years in age.

Approach: Participating schools were stratified into 4 levels of risk, which was assessed using data on enrollment, truancy, mobility, family income, and achievement scores. Schools were then assigned using a randomized block design. Within schools, students were randomly assigned to two experimental groups and one control group, also using a randomized block design. The two experimental groups utilized the social development curriculum (SDC) and the school community intervention (SCI). The control group was given the health enhancement curriculum (HEC). Like the SDC program, the HEC also attempted to foster students’ cultural pride and communalism.

The curricula were taught by university-based health educators over the course of four years. In most cases, the health educators remained with the same school, to prevent contamination across groups. Two training sessions were held for the educators before each lesson, with senior staff providing feedback during training and observation during lessons. The classrooms’ regular teachers attended a four-hour workshop to outline the curriculum and their support roles. Surveys administered by trained project staff were completed by the students at the end of each grade year.

Results: Among males, the SCI significantly reduced the rate of increase of multiple risk behaviors, including violence, provoking behavior, school delinquency, combined behavior, substance use, and sexual activity. The SDC had similar, but only marginally significant impacts, compared with the SCI. There was no impact on males’ condom use. The SCI had a larger impact in the total combined behaviors analysis than did the SDC.

There were no significant program impacts for girls. The HEC may have been more effective than a standard control condition, because of the way in which the program integrated cultural pride into the curriculum. The effectiveness of the control group may explain the lack of impact among females. Also, the risk behaviors targeted by the program occur at lower baseline levels for females, so it may be more difficult to achieve reductions, than is the case with males.

Study limitations include the small number of schools, and the schools’ high student turnover rates, along with the similarity across the curricula, particularly the elements concerning cultural pride and communalism components, used by the control and experimental groups.

Study 2

Segawa, E., Ngwe, J. E., Li, Y., Flay, B. R., & Aban Aya Coinvestigators (2005). Evaluation of the effect of the Aban Aya Youth Project in reducing violence among African American adolescent males using latent class growth mixture modeling techniques. Evaluation Review, 19(2), 128-148

Evaluated population: The sample from Study 1.

Approach: See Study 1 for randomization process.

Self-report pre-test data were collected from participating students at the beginning of 5^th grade in the fall of 1994. Post-test self report data were collected at the end of grades 5 through 8 in the spring of 1995, 1996, 1997, and 1998. Survey measures asked students about their violent behaviors over their lifetime, and in the past 3 months (90 days). Together these measures comprised a violence scale consisting of seven items: 1) carrying a gun, 2) carrying a knife, 3) threatening to beat up siblings, 4) threatening to beat up someone else, 5) threatening to cut, stab, or shoot people, 6) cutting or stabbing someone, and 7) shooting someone. Each item was scored on a scale of 0 to 3 (0 = never; 1= yes for lifetime, but not in the past 3 months; 2 = once in the past 3 months; 3 = more than once in the past 3 months). Item scores were added to produce violence scale scores ranging from 0-21.

Results: The data for this evaluation were analyzed using a latent class growth modeling strategy. This formula measures the first incidence of violent behavior, as well as the total violence level for participants. For boys, the SCI resulted in significant impacts for all outcomes: self-reported violence, provoking behavior, school delinquency, substance use, sexual activity, and condom use. At pre-test, the SCI group and the HEC group were not significantly different. At the last post-test, the HEC group had a significantly higher level of violence, compared with the SCI group. In a subgroup analysis of low-, medium-, and high-risk for violence groups, program impacts were three times as large in the high-risk class as in the other two.

Note: The schools were chosen to have moderate levels of student turnover (less than 50% annually). Students who transferred out were not followed up, and students who transferred in were included in the sample, for the data points for which they provided information. This unusual strategy suggests the desirability of school level analyses; however, the data are analyzed at the individual level. However, the statistical procedures address this, and also address issues caused by missing data.

Ngwe, J. E., Liu, L. C., Flay, B. R, Segawa, E., & Aban Aya Co-Investigators. (2004). Violence prevention among African American adolescent males. American Journal of Health Behavior, 28, S24-S37.

Evaluated population: The sample from Study 1 was evaluated.

Approach: The intervention was administered in the fifth grade. Data were collected pre-intervention, again at the end of the school year, and annually over the next four years given. Participants completed a survey at each data collection point. Items of interest for this analysis included violence behavior, behavioral intentions, attitudes towards violence, estimate of peers’ behaviors, estimate of best friend’s behavior, and peer encouragement.

Results: Results revealed that the growth over time in violence among the intervention group was significantly lower than in the control group.

SOURCES FOR MORE INFORMATION

Link to program curriculum: http://www.socio.com/srch/summary/pasha/full/passt24.htm

References

Ngwe, J. E., Liu, L. C., Flay, B. R, Segawa, E., & Aban Aya Co-Investigators. (2004). Violence prevention among African American adolescent males. American Journal of Health Behavior, 28, S24-S37.

KEYWORDS: Adolescents, Elementary, Middle Schools, Males and Females (co-ed), High-Risk, Black/African American, Urban, Community-Based, Manual is Available, Cost Information is Available, Skills Training, Aggression, Delinquency, Other Substance Use, Sexual Activity, Contraception and Condom Use

Program information last updated 12/19/11