In
today’s society, the top two diseases that younger generations tend to face the
most are alcohol abuse and depression. These diseases are associated with
increasing the potential for suicide and decrease in functioning. To help treat
these diseases, an Internet-based intervention became available for individuals
who were less likely to seek out traditional forms of treatment.
To
research the effectiveness of Internet-based self-help programmes in reaching
out to eighteen to twenty-five year old, researchers conducted a study based
on the Self Help for Alcohol/ and other drug use and Depression’s (SHADE)
concepts by incorporating use of storytelling, interpreting user experiences,
and examples. To conduct the test, researchers used two different types of
groups. One type of groups that participated in the study was youth focus
groups that were recruited via word-of-mouth and advertisements posted around a
university’s campus. The second type of groups that participated in the study was
twelve field professionals who were contacted via email; their role in the
study was to provide feedback on the development of the programme. The
participants in the study were administered the self-help Internet-based
programme and then were asked to rate, on a scale of strongly disagree,
disagree, agree, and strongly agree, questions asked pertaining to the
programme. Both groupings had their own type of survey to complete after the
programme. The youth focus groups were asked to use the rating scale to answer questions
of the programme’s applicability in helping young adults in reducing alcohol
use and treating depression. The professionals were asked to use the rating
scale to answer questions about the content being age appropriate, understandable,
valid, and an appropriate length.
Overall,
the study was found valid to what was being tested, but from the focus groups
feedback, changes were made to the programme for improvement. Researchers
found, through this study, that this form of intervention may have value in
being applicable and engaging for younger adults and that the involvement of
the professionals made this form of research more likely to be accepted and used
as a resource for treatment of alcohol use and depression. Limitations were of
the programme were that the researchers used screenshots rather than the actual
online version of it and that the young participants involved in the study were
not a clinical sample and only represented potential users based on demographics.
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2214782914000189
Deady,
M., Mills, K., Kay-Lambkin, F., Teesson, M. (2014). Developing an integrated,
internet-based self-help programme for young people with depression and alcohol
use problems. ScienceDirect, 1(3), 118-131. doi: 10.1016/j.invent.2014.06.004
No comments:
Post a Comment