Preparation and measures used for the tool
You are required to prepare a data collection tool. This will entail preparing the measures and describing your rationale for the wording, format and order of the questions. Explain the way that you intend the instrument to be implemented.
Youth illicit drug strategies are frequently being implemented at community level for reducing the prevalence of drug use among this chosen population in the country. The aims of these strategies are multi-dimensional, with the prime focus on bringing positive changes in drug usage behaviors. It is to be noted that for understanding the effectiveness of such a promising project, it is essential to evaluate it adequately. Application of a suitable data collection tool is pivotal for aligning the data collection with the objectives of the program. Data collection tools act as the driving vehicle for proposing changes to the program. The present paper is on the development of a project evaluation tool for evaluating a youth illicit drug strategy. The paper presents a background to the preparation of the tool, the tool itself, the rationale for the questions used in the tool and the possible outcomes of data collection upon application of the tool.
The aim of the tool to be used for evaluation of the youth illicit drug strategy was to focus on reduction of usage of ecstasy and other party drugs. The areas that were to be covered in the evaluation tool were general demographics, drug usage behaviors, times and venues of drug use, attitudes towards drug taking, knowledge of impacts of drugs, perceived social expectations about drug use, level of motivation for avoiding drugs, exposure to relevant education. Questions directly relate to these sections for having a comprehensive overview of the topic. Background knowledge of the individual’s drug using behavior is crucial for knowing the potential of reduction of drug using behaviors. Exploration of the drug habits and attitudes was the main focus of the tool. Social aspects of drug using behavior are also to be highlighted when addressing chances of positive behavior. The tool was prepared in such a manner that it is simple to use and can extract maximum information at the same level. The layout had to be simple and jargon free. Further, culturally sensitivity was to be instilled in the tool for making it appropriate for all members of the community (Green & Thorogood, 2018).
Instruction related to the tool:
Youth Illicit Drug Strategy Evaluation Tool
This tool has been developed for evaluation of impact illicit drug strategy on drug usage behavior of youths. It is intended to use the results obtained from the questionnaire to inform policy changes and proposed modification of health services. The confidentiality of respondents and non-disclosure of sensitive information in the questionnaire are most important priority of the survey. There is no compulsion on taking part in the survey and anyone can voluntary take part in the survey or withdraw from it if they are comfortable to answer any questions. Demograpic question has been collected to assess impact of behavior in different ethnic group. Please note while taking demographic response, we advise not to provide names to comply with confidentiality requirement of the survey. Please follow the instructions given to start answering the questions.
Signature……………………….. Date: …………………………….
Instruction for filling the form:
While entering response, you are advised to tick in boxes where applicable or fill in response in given spaces. For privacy related concerns, you do not need to give response related to your name.
- DOB: ………………………
- Date: …………………………..
- Gender: ……………………
- Ethnicity: ………………………..
( ) Indigenous Australian
( ) Native Australian
( ) African American
( ) Asian
( ) Hispanic
( ) Caucasian
( ) Others
- Do you admit that you take drugs?
( ) Yes
( ) No
- What is your education level?
( ) School dropout
( ) High school passed
( ) Graduate
( ) Post graduate
- What is your occupation?
( ) Self-employed
( ) Service
( ) Business
( ) Others
- What is your father’s education level?
( ) Self-employed
( ) Service
( ) Business
( ) Others
- For how long have you been taking drugs?
( ) 1 month
( ) 2months-6 months
( ) 6 months-1 year
( ) More than 1 year
- What was the driving factor behind your addiction to drugs?
( ) Friends
( ) Family
( ) Social influence
( ) Media presentations
- Which is to most common party drug you use?
( ) Ecstasy
( ) LSD
( ) GHB
( ) Ketamine
- Do you take drugs only at parties?
( ) Yes
( ) No
- Have you had any criminal involvement?
( ) Yes
( ) No
- Do your parents know about your drug addiction?
( ) Yes
( ) No
- How often do you use drugs now?
( ) Never
( ) One time a day
( ) Several times a day
( ) Once or twice in a week
- When did you last use drugs/
( ) Yesterday
( ) Earlier this week
( ) Last week
( ) Earlier this month
- You usually start taking drugs when
( ) You are lonely
( ) You feel stressed
( ) You are with your friends
( ) You want to have fun
- How do you get your drugs?
( ) From family
( ) From friends
( ) From drug sellers
- What effects do you feel due to drugs?
( ) No problem at all
( ) I can control it and set limits
Instructions Related to the Tool
( ) I need help to control
( ) I need professional help to control
- Are you aware of the impacts of drugs on health and wellbeing?
( ) Yes
( ) No
- Which of the following drugs causes addiction according to you?
( ) Ectasy
( ) Sleeping pills
( ) Crack
( ) Analgesic
( ) LSD
( ) Opium
( ) Morphine
( ) Cocaine
- Which are the symptoms of drug use complications?
( ) Constipation and dry mouth
( ) Diarrhea
( ) Brain damage
( ) Myadriasis
- Which one is caused due to stimulant?
( ) Dry mouth and diarrhea
( ) Brain damage
( ) Renal failure and damage
( ) Hearing unreal sounds and seeing unreal images
- How do others see you in relation to your drug use?
( ) Normal for my age
( ) Others neglect me when they come to know that I take drugs
( ) My family tells me to stop drug use
( ) My friends tell me to stop drug use
- Where do you get information about drug cessation/?
( ) School or workplace
( ) Television
( ) Hoardings and banners
( ) Campaigns
- What is the main factor for avoiding drug use?
( ) Better academics
( ) Better workplace performance
( ) Enhanced social relationships
- Would you refer others to use drugs in future?
( ) Yes
( ) No
- Would you like to receive additional information about drug cessation and like to have professional help?
( ) Yes
( ) Know
- What form of education would you like to receive?
( ) Informative videos
( ) Pamphlets
( ) One-one-one sessions
( ) Group counseling
Rational for wording, format and order of the tool:
The tool that has been developed for illicit drug strategy evaluation has 30 questions and all questions are close-ended questions. Although close-ended questionnaires limits the comprehensiveness of data obtained, however the advantage of using close-ended questionnaire is that it is easier and quicker for respondents to answer the questions. Hence, as the tool has been developed to evaluate reduction in drug usage among youths, the main aim is to cover as many youths as possible to determine the beneficial effect of the youth drug strategy. Close ended questions will help to quickly complete the assessment and effectively analyze the data too. While preparing the tool, several choices have been given for each question. The main rational for providing choices is to ensure that youths do not get confused or give irrelevant answers to the question. The list of choices can also help respondents to understand meaning of each question and quickly give response (Brace, 2018). One reason for which close-ended question is not favored is that often these questions lead to simplistic response from participants and more complex issues are ignored. However, this issue has been addressed in the questionnaire by reviewing research studies and includes most common factors that influence drug use behavior or attitude towards drug use among youths as choices in the questionnaire. This discussion justified the rational for the format and choices of questionnaires in the tool.
Instructions for filling the form
Apart from format of the tool, the most important part of developing the tool was the use of wordings and order of questionnaires. To frame the questionnaires, the first activity that was undertaken was to list down list of information that needs to be obtained from the youth. The list included knowledge related to demographic characteristics, drug usage behavior, venues and time of drugs usage, knowledge of impacts of drugs, attitude towards drugs, social expectation and motivation towards drug usage and exposure to education. There are different rational for obtaining above information from youth and the rational is explained in the order in which it has been arranged in the tool. The tool had list of 30 questions and the first nine questions had questions on demographic factors. Ethnicity was also included in this part because great variations in drug usage among ethnic group are seen (Wu et al., 2011). Hence, ethnicity factor may be linked with participant’s response to understand whether ethnic group are disproportionately affected by drug-related problem or not.
After demographic factors, the tool covered questions on timing of drug usage, frequency of drug usage and venue of drug usage (Question 10 to 17). The main rational for these questionnaires was to assess the level of exposure to illicit drugs among use. This may help to predict presence of positive or negative triggers influencing drug usage among youths. Alhyas et al. (2015) explains that deeper understanding of attitudes and perceptions of adolescents towards drug use helps to predict their awareness of substance use, pattern of use and associated harm. Knowledge regarding attitude and perception towards drug use may help to implement multi-factoral prevention programmes that address social norms and other social issues contributing to the behavior in youths. The next set of questionnaires in the tool covered details on attitude towards drug taking and level of motivation to avoid drug usage. The main rational for these questions was to evaluate the effect of youth illicit drug strategy on changing attitude towards drug usage and find out sources of information available regarding harm of illicit drugs. The next question was related to motivation and this was included to understand how knowledge towards harm effect of drugs influenced motivation towards drug use among respondents. It may help to understand the mechanism behind initiation and maintenance of addictive behavior (Köpetz et al., 2013). Kelly et al. (2015) suggest that drug abuse is influenced by knowledge and attitude towards drugs and assessment of knowledge and attitude is necessary to correct and change a behavior. With this rational, the above mentioned elements were covered in the tool.
Method of implementation of the tool:
Usage of ecstasy drugs and other party drugs among youths may lead to severe physical, social and emotional complications. To evaluate the effect of an illicit drug strategy in reducing usage of drugs, it is essential to implement the above mentioned tool in screening programs or settings where youths are most likely to be found. To assess behavioral change and awareness of youths related to adverse impact of drug, it is planned to implement the tool for assessment in University and high school settings. Evidence also shows university as a common setting to assess drug abuse behavior in youths (Brown et al. 2015). The approval for the assessment of youths in each setting can be done after taking approval from the institutional review board. They can be informed regarding the purpose of interview and duration of interview. The structure and format of questionnaires used in the tool is such that the interview will be conducted in 10 minutes only. The tool has been designed in such a way that adequate information related to drug abuse behavior of youth can be assessed in a short duration. This will favor high participation of youths and screening of a large section of target youth population.
To implement the tool for assessment in target setting, it is also planned to recruit registered nurses in screening program. The main rational for this is that nurses are largest group of licensed health care professional and they have the skills to deliver the tool as well as understand treatment needs of client. They can use the opportunity to screen as well as constructively identify behavioral modification or increased uptake of illicit drugs among youth (Strobbe, Perhats & Broyles, 2013). The questionnaire used in the tool will be the main basic of inquiry regarding behavioral change in youths after the implementation of illicit drug strategy. After receiving response from participants related to each sections, the answers will be evaluated to understand how psychosocial factors affects drug usage among youths. The question has been designed in such a way that it can identify social influence and cultural factors contributing to illicit drug use. Based on response received from youths, risk factors of drug abuse or barriers to behavioral change can be identified. Based on this type of assessment, the youth illicit drug strategy can be modified or other relevant interventions to address behavioral modification and attitude towards drug abuse can be done.
Conclusion:
The report gave an insight the development of a tool for assessing reduction in usage of ecstasy and other party drugs among youth in response to the implementation of a youth illicit drug strategy. The use of 30 questionnaire based tools and rational for the wordings, format and order of the questions gave an overview about the approaches that is needed to develop a tool. Identification of the purpose of tool and list of information that needs to be obtained is critical to develop a framework for questionnaire. Critical review of these factors also helped in the development of tool for this task. As youths are more prone to risk of drug abuse and illicit drug usage, proper implementation of the tool is necessary to identify the factors that influence attitude and knowledge towards drugs use. The integration of this tool in health care and youth setting may help to identify risk behavior of teenagers and youth and identify need for suitable intervention to decrease drug abuse in the society. The data obtained from the tool can also act as guide for policy makers to implements strategies for optimal health of youths.
References:
Alhyas, L., Al Ozaibi, N., Elarabi, H., El-Kashef, A., Wanigaratne, S., Almarzouqi, A., … Al Ghaferi, H. (2015). Adolescents’ perception of substance use and factors influencing its use: a qualitative study in Abu Dhabi. JRSM Open, 6(2), 2054270414567167. https://doi.org/10.1177/2054270414567167
Brace, I. (2018). Questionnaire design: How to plan, structure and write survey material for effective market research. Kogan Page Publishers.
Brown, S. A., Brumback, T., Tomlinson, K., Cummins, K., Thompson, W. K., Nagel, B. J., … Tapert, S. F. (2015). The National Consortium on Alcohol and NeuroDevelopment in Adolescence (NCANDA): A Multisite Study of Adolescent Development and Substance Use. Journal of Studies on Alcohol and Drugs, 76(6), 895–908. https://doi.org/10.15288/jsad.2015.76.895
Geramian, N., Gharaat, L., Taheri, S. A., Mohebpour, F., Nahvizadeh, M., Farajzadegan, Z., & Heidari, K. (2014). Development of a Questionnaire to Assess Drug Abuse among High School Students of Isfahan Province, Iran: An Action Research. International Journal of Preventive Medicine, 5(Suppl 2), S146–S153.
Green, J., & Thorogood, N. (2018). Qualitative methods for health research. Sage.
Kelly, A. B., Evans-Whipp, T. J., Smith, R., Chan, G. C. K., Toumbourou, J. W., Patton, G. C., … Catalano, R. F. (2015). A LONGITUDINAL STUDY OF THE ASSOCIATION OF ADOLESCENT POLYDRUG USE, ALCOHOL USE, AND HIGH SCHOOL NON-COMPLETION. Addiction (Abingdon, England), 110(4), 627–635. https://doi.org/10.1111/add.12829
Köpetz, C. E., Lejuez, C. W., Wiers, R. W., & Kruglanski, A. W. (2013). Motivation and Self-Regulation in Addiction: A Call for Convergence. Perspectives on Psychological Science?: A Journal of the Association for Psychological Science, 8(1), 3–24. https://doi.org/10.1177/1745691612457575
Strobbe, S., Perhats, C., & Broyles, L. M. (2013). Expanded roles and responsibilities for nurses in screening, brief intervention, and referral to treatment (SBIRT) for alcohol use. Journal of addictions nursing, 24(3), 203-204.
Wu, L. T., Woody, G. E., Yang, C., Pan, J. J., & Blazer, D. G. (2011). Racial/ethnic variations in substance-related disorders among adolescents in the United States. Archives of General Psychiatry, 68(11), 1176-1185.
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