An impact evaluation of power through choices pregnancy prevention intervention for system-involved youth - the university of maryland, baltimore: school of social work (umssw) in collaboration with…

An impact evaluation of power through choices pregnancy prevention intervention for system-involved youth - the university of maryland, baltimore: school of social work (umssw) in collaboration with healthy teen network (HTN) is applying to the US office of population affairs' teenage pregnancy prevention evaluation and research grants program to fund a secondary data analysis teen pregnancy prevention impact evaluation. Despite sustained decreases in adolescent birth rates in the last 20 years and federal efforts to decrease teen birth rates, persistent disparities remain between birth rates for the nation at large and our most vulnerable populations, particularly youth in systems of care such as the child welfare and juvenile justice systems. The purpose of this proposal is to explore new questions from data collected of evaluations of power through choices (PTC), an efficacious, evidence-based curriculum designed to prevent teen pregnancy by reducing sexual risk behaviors and increasing contraceptive use in system-involved youth, developed and owned by HTN. The proposed analysis focuses on identifying which core components of PTC contribute to its effectiveness as an evidence-based intervention; and, concurrently examines its effectiveness among subgroups of these youth based on social and behavioral characteristics known to have an impact on teen pregnancy, such as aggression and violence, prosocial and problem peers, and substance use. This will expand on the prior studies by concatenating the data from two concurrent evaluation trials providing a larger sample for investigating potential differential intervention effects by risk factors and patterns of CO-occurrence of the risk factors.