EFFEKT

The EFFEKT program seeks to reduce teen drinking by changing the attitudes of their parents. This is accomplished through structured presentations at their child’s school. Each school held parent informational meetings at the start of a semester, with program workers in attendance. At the first of these meetings, workers gave a 30-minute description of the program. They advised parents to adopt or maintain a zero-tolerance position toward youth drinking and communicate clear rules to their children. The project workers suggested that parents in attendance formulate and sign agreements about their positions concerning youth drinking. These agreements were mailed to all parents, including those who had not attended. Parents received at least three mailings each semester, including letters describing the parent meetings.

EFFEKT seeks to reduce teenage alcohol use by changing the attitudes of their parents. Information is disseminated to the parents at school meetings at the beginning of each semester and through regular communications.

EFFEKT seeks to reduce teen drinking by changing parental behaviors through structured presentations at their child’s school. Working with parents proved to be an effective way to reduce underage drinking as well as teen delinquency.

Parents in the treatment group — those participating in the EFFEKT program — at baseline were significantly less strict in their attitudes and more permissive of underage drinking than parents in the control group. At post-test, analysis of covariance (ANCOVA) results demonstrated that EFFEKT parents became significantly stricter in permissiveness than control group parents. Additionally, parents in the control group became more lenient with their children during the same period. Alcohol use increased for both groups over time. However, adolescents in the control group had a greater increase in alcohol use and drunkenness than those in the intervention group. Similar to alcohol, delinquency increased for both groups over time. However, alcohol use in the treatment group did not increase as quickly as the control group. Adolescents in the control group had significantly higher levels of delinquency than the intervention group at post-test, controlling for baseline levels.