The efficacy and mechanisms of personality-targeted interventions for alcohol misuse and mental disorders in adolescents
Bibliographic record
Abstract
This thesis includes four studies pertaining to the efficacy and mechanisms of a personality-targeted intervention program for youth alcohol misuse and psychopathology. Study 1 examines the efficacy of the Preventure personality-targeted intervention program on internalising and externalising symptoms in high-risk youth when delivered by educational professionals. Results demonstrate that intervention participants report global reductions in depressive, anxiety and conduct symptoms relative to their control group counterparts, as well as reduced odds of severe depressive symptoms and conduct problems over two years. There is also some evidence for personality-specific intervention effects in youth most at risk for anxiety and conduct disorders. Study 2 explores the relationship between personality, attentional biases and mental disorders in a community adolescent sample. This study provides a preliminary examination of whether attentional biases may be a suitable target for preventive interventions to supplement the Preventure program. Results suggest that attentional biases to emotional faces are not concurrently or prospectively associated with symptoms of mental disorders. Instead, results provide further validation for a personality-targeted approach, as personality traits are associated with concurrent and prospective risk for mental disorders whilst accounting for baseline mental health symptoms. Studies 3 and 4 focus on understanding the mechanisms and process of the Preventure program across two randomised controlled trials. Study 3 explores mediators of two-year intervention effects on alcohol misuse and mental health symptoms. Results suggest that two-year intervention effects on binge drinking and alcohol-related problems are partially mediated by early changes in drinking behaviours. Global improvements in mood during the six months post-intervention were found to partially mediate two-year intervention effects on both internalising and externalising symptoms. The results suggest that early reductions in the growth in alcohol consumption or mental health symptoms may represent proximal markers of longer term intervention efficacy. Lastly, study 4 uses a mixed methods design to elucidate candidate process variables accounting for early indicators of treatment efficacy. The study combines both investigator-driven hypotheses and youth-generated feedback in order to elucidate key intervention features associated with positive behavioural changes. Findings suggest that youth experiences during group personality-targeted intervention sessions can influence the development of their subsequent alcohol-related behaviours (and, in some cases, in mental health symptoms) over twelve months. This study suggests that youth feedback can be used as an early indicator of treatment fidelity and efficacy. Together, these studies contribute to the literature in support of a personality-targeted approach to prevention and demonstrate the utility of process research in informing and refining the intervention approach.
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How this classification was reachedexpand
Full frame machine prediction
Teacher imitationNot calibrated prevalence, not ground truth. Human validation pending. The Gemma side is a direct model label for every work in the frame, read from the title-only record. The Codex side is a classifier learned from the 10,348 direct Codex labels and calibrated to design-weighted sample rates; fields without enough sample support carry no Codex call. Candidate is the union of the two sides; consensus is their intersection. These outputs are machine_predicted_unvalidated and are not human labels.
Distilled classifier scores by category (both heads)
| Category | Codex | Gemma |
|---|---|---|
| Metaresearch | 0.003 | 0.014 |
| Meta-epidemiology (narrow) | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Meta-epidemiology (broad) | 0.000 | 0.001 |
| Bibliometrics | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Science and technology studies | 0.000 | 0.001 |
| Scholarly communication | 0.001 | 0.001 |
| Open science | 0.001 | 0.001 |
| Research integrity | 0.000 | 0.001 |
| Insufficient payload (model declined to judge) | 0.002 | 0.000 |
Machine scores (provisional)
The two teacher heads of the student model, read on this work. A score orders the frame for review; it never asserts a category, and the validation status ships verbatim with every row.
Baseline scores from an immature model (maturity gate not passed, 7 training rounds). Scores rank; they never assert a category.
score_only:v0-immature-baseline · verbatim from the scoring run: score_only means the number may rank works, and no category label ships from itClassification
machine, unvalidatedMachine predicted; a candidate call from one source (direct Gemma or distilled Codex), not a consensus.
How this classification was reached, model by model and score by score, is at the end of the page under "How this classification was reached".