Web-based Intervention for Disaster-Affected Youth and Families

A single disaster, terrorist attack, or other large-scale incident can adversely affect thousands of youth and families. Immediate consequences may include unmet basic needs and high economic burden, particularly among underserved populations. Disasters also can dramatically affect family roles and relationships over time (e.g., family routines, marital stress, parent-child interactions). Whereas most youth are resilient in the aftermath of disasters (i.e., do not develop serious mental health or health-risk problems), the prevalence of various problems of public health significance (e.g., PTSD, depression, substance abuse) clearly increases in this population. This underscores the need for effective, widely accessible, culturally-appropriate and cost-efficient interventions that foster resilience or rapid recovery relative to the health effects of disasters. Yet, few evidence-informed resources are available to youth and families to facilitate post-disaster resilience and recovery. Primary aims of this project are: (a) to develop a Web-based intervention for disaster-affected adolescents and parents targeting prevalent health-related correlates of disasters (i.e., development phase), (b) to conduct a randomized controlled population-based study to examine feasibility and preliminary efficacy of the intervention (i.e., randomized controlled trial [RCT] phase) and cultural relevance (i.e., perceived applicability of the intervention to one's cultural group), and (c) to refine the intervention based on RCT-phase data.