While relatively few effective programs have been developed for mainstream school students, none have been adapted and evaluated among high-risk youth attending alternative schools. Safer Choices is one of the few programs that has been demonstrated to be effective in reducing sexual risk-taking behaviors among adolescents. The aims of the intervention are to reduce the number of high-risk youth who engage in unprotected sexual intercourse by reducing the number of youth who initiate sexual intercourse and by increasing condom use among those students who are sexually active. Social cognitive theory and social influence processes form the primary framework for the program. The youth development component additionally makes use of social resources theory and social bonding model.
Community linkages and resources.
The major dependent variables are unprotected sexual intercourse, number of sexual partners, and proportion having sexual intercourse in the past three months. The central hypothesis of this proposal is that specific catalytic Abs against HIV-1 gp120 could be expressed in subjects with autoimmune disease. Such antibodies may have therapeutic potential for inactivation of HIV-1 infectivity through specific proteolysis at viral capsid sites. Molecular studies suggest that a serine protease-like active site at or near the antigen binding site of peptidase Abs is encoded by a germline VL gene. These studies will also examine if proteolytic degradation at specific gp120 sites, including a neutralizing epitope for conventional anti bodies leads to more effective inactivation of the virus.