Testing Protocol

Measures of Tobacco Use, Attitudes, and Knowledge:

A comprehensive baseline questionnaire on tobacco use, knowledges, and attitudes is given at baseline and follow-up assessments to participating youth, staff, and adults in the proposed program. This questionnaire is organized into three sections and includes items from the standardized statewide evaluations. The first section focuses on previous and current tobacco use and the environment the respondent experiences tobacco use in. Representative items query on any previous usage (at least one puff), frequency of tobacco use in lifetime, currently, and in the last 30 days. Questions on how many brothers smoke, whether parents and friends smoke, are also included. Questions about age of first cigarette, opinions about whether it is OK to smoke, and where the respondent smokes are also included. Beliefs about whether cigarettes should be sold to children are also evaluated. Also, the use of alcohol and other tobacco-associated substance abuse are also evaluated. A second part of the tobacco use evaluation focuses on knowledge (true,false, or don't know) relating to the effects that cigarette smoking may have upon health, such as raising blood pressure, increasing risk of cancer, staining teeth, and whether it is habit forming. A third part relates to certain attitudes towards smoking (there are also attitude questions in the first part), including evaluating the notion of whether it helps people to relax, and whether the respondent feels comfortable being around or going out with people who smoke.

Measures of Health Risk Factors:

The use of valid, reliable, measuring instruments and scientific procedures are crucial to the study evaluation. The multiple indicators and measurement model used in Project SHARP offers quantitative measurement of mediating role between program participation, measures of tobacco use, and health risk and behavior factors, (smoking measured by family history self report and blood pressure, body composition and Harter's self-esteem). This measurement evaluation model can be used to validate the replacing of the expensive measures in trial studies for inexpensive measures in regular school curriculum.

Blood pressure will be taken at the school site for all participants. Two measures taken with the right arm, after a 5 minute rest and the average of the two determinations will be used for analysis. Hypertension is a significant health risk factor for heart disease and stroke among Blacks and Asian and there is a moderate level of tracking of blood pressure levels from childhood to adulthood.

Body composition including height, weight, and estimated percent body fat will be taken for children. Three measurements at subscapular and tricep sites, using the median scores for analysis and measurements of height and weight will be used to obtain levels of body fat as calculated by body mass index. Body composition is an important correlate of body image and self-esteem.

Cardiovascular endurance will be measured by a mile run. A paced mile run increases the performance score validity because it can control aerobic energy expenditure and contribute to improved motivation. The mile run is considered a useful indicator of cardiopulmonary fitness and short term consequences of a sedentary active life style.

Measures of Health Behaviors:

Youth Medical History - A health behavior survey for youth including key questions on tobacco use and attitudes will provide triangulated evaluation of the tobacco survey responses.

Family Medical History - A self-report bilingual inventory which surveys each family for heart disease, blood pressure, tobacco use, alcohol, drug practices, diabetes and dietary habits. The tobacco prevalence survey includes onset number of cigarettes smoked and rate of usage.

These surveys establish the basis of the analysis of the association between health behaviors and risk levels as well as cross validate family usage. It is ethically incumbent to provide a medical referral to appropriate treatment sources for high risk participants.

Measures of Self-esteem:

Harter's Sense of Self Survey - To help determine the effect the intervention programs have on the children's self-esteem, Harter's Self Perception Profile for Children and Weiss' Locus of Control for Physical Education will be administered. Both questionnaires are of a non-threatening nature that can be completed within two 30-minute sessions.

Harter's profile, "What I Am Like", taps six specific domains of behavior. They are a) scholastic competence, b) physical competence, c) social acceptance, d) physical appearance, e) behavioral conduct, f) global self worth. This profile will provide information about children's perceived competence, one psychological construct, when paired with locus of control data enables us to tap into children's self-esteem.

Weiss' scale of perceived locus of control, "Why Things Happen" examines children's beliefs as to which control source is responsible for performance outcomes. The scale contains twelve items that pertain to external, internal, and unknown control sources. Locus of control data in conjunction with perceived competence data yields a rather clear picture of children's self-esteem.

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Contact Project Trust: Dr. Stanley Bassin, Dr. Don Morris
last modified 10/97