Abstract
Community coalitions are a prominent organizational structure through which community-based substance abuse prevention efforts are implemented. There is little empirical evidence, however, regarding the association between coalition attributes and success in achieving community-level reductions in substance abuse behaviors. In this study, we assessed the relationship between coalition capacity, based on coalition coordinator responses to 16 survey items, and reductions in underage drinking prevalence rates. The coalitions were funded through the federally sponsored Strategic Prevention Framework State Incentive Grant (SPF SIG). We first examined whether coalition capacity increased over the life of the projects. Mean capacity scores increased for all 16 capacity items examined (N = 318 coalitions), the majority of which were statistically significant. Analysis of the associations between capacity and reductions in underage drinking was limited to coalitions that targeted underage drinking and provided usable outcome measures based on student survey data for either past 30-day alcohol use (N = 129) or binge drinking (N = 100). Bivariate associations between the capacity items and prevalence reductions for each outcome were consistently positive, although many were not statistically significant. Composite measures of correlated items were then created to represent six different capacity constructs, and included in multivariate models to predict reductions in the targeted outcomes. Constructs that significantly predicted reductions in one or both outcome measures included internal organization and structure, community connections and outreach, and funding from multiple sources. The findings provide support for the expectation that high functioning community coalitions can be effective agents for producing desirable community-level changes in targeted substance abuse behaviors.
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Notes
For most measures, their exact definition is apparent from the information provided in Table 1. For measures based on counts, however, the specific elements that contribute to each measure are not listed. This information is available in the CLI instrument, which can be obtained from the corresponding author.
For internal organization and structure, the score was the mean value of its three component domain scores.
In addition, regression models that tested all the capacity measures simultaneously showed that the entire set was highly significant (p < .001) in predicting changes in both outcome measures (detailed findings not shown).
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Acknowledgments
The authors appreciate the support for this paper provided by project officers John Park at CSAP and Elizabeth Robertson and Augie Diana of NIDA, and by cross-site evaluation project director Rob Orwin. We also acknowledge the contributions to the literature review by Melinda Pankratz, statistical consultation provided by Chris Wiesen, and the time and effort of the many coalition coordinators and state evaluators who provided the essential data for this study. The helpful suggestions from the anonymous reviewers assigned to this manuscript are also appreciated.
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Support for this study was provided by the National Institute on Drug Abuse, administered through the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration’s Center for Substance Abuse Prevention, Task Order Numbers 283-07-0609 and 277-09-0319. The views expressed in this article are those of the authors and do not necessarily represent the position of the sponsoring agencies.
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This study involved secondary analyses of aggregate-level summary data based on information provided by anonymous respondents to student surveys.
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Flewelling, R.L., Hanley, S.M. Assessing Community Coalition Capacity and its Association with Underage Drinking Prevention Effectiveness in the Context of the SPF SIG. Prev Sci 17, 830–840 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11121-016-0675-y
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11121-016-0675-y