It is based on the knowledge that information and awareness are preconditions that set the stage for change and that people learn by seeing others model the desired behaviors and values. Second, training is provided in the skills adolescents need to translate the information into action. Third, adolescents are given opportunities to practice and receive corrective feedback, using skills in a safe environment with their peers before they face the challenges of using them in risky situations. Fourth, social support is provided for the desired behaviors, to help make them the norm in the youth's social environment. Becoming A Responsible Teen includes session outlines, instructions for group leaders, handouts for duplication, parent consent forms, and general guidelines for setting up the program.
Costs vary depending on the size of the group trained.
In addition, there may be a local trainer in your state who is qualified to provide Becoming A Responsible Teen trainings. In addition to information about AIDS and prevention of HIV infection, the youth participated in activities to build skills in correct condom use, assertive communication, refusal, information provision, self management, problem solving, and risk recognition. Group sizes ranged from 5 to 15, and sessions lasted from 90 to 120 minutes each. Fourteen sets of sessions were conducted over 3 years in a comprehensive community health center serving predominately low-income minority residents in a Southern urban area of 400,000. In comparison to their behavior before the intervention, and in comparison with those in the control group, youth who participated in the intervention were more likely to use condoms and less likely to engage in unprotected vaginal or anal intercourse.