Cultivating professional allies for sexual minority youth: A community-based educational intervention
Craig, S. L., Doiron, C., & Dillon, F. (2015). Cultivating professional allies for sexual minority youth: A community-based educational intervention. Journal of Homosexuality, 62(12), 1703–1721. https://doi.org/10.1080/00918369.2015.1078208
Highlights
Background
Sexual minority youth (SMY) face multiple risks in their daily lives that may influence their need for supportive care.
Health and social service providers have unique opportunities to provide culturally competent services to these youth yet despite a myriad of available trainings, little is known about their effect on behaviour change.
Study Description
This article describes a community-based educational intervention created to increase providers’ knowledge, skills, and intention to support SMY
The intervention was based on the Information-Motivation-Behavioural Skills model, which emphasizes acquisition of knowledge, motivation to use knowledge, and acquisition of skills and tools to facilitate new behaviours
Each CBEI followed a general format and included six core components (Figure 1)
Key Findings
This pilot study found that for a diverse sample of multidisciplinary professionals (n = 2,850), the odds of behavioural intention to support SMY were significantly higher when trainings:
were relevant to the professionals’ experience (odds ratio = 1.3),
were sensitive (odds ratio = 1.3),
developed skills (odds ratio = 1.1),
and incorporated policy (odds ratio = 1.2).
As such, delivery of community-based trainings should:
Be relevant to participants’ professional experiences and environments
Encourage discussion about sensitive issues relating to SMY
Focus on the enhancement of participant skills by adding opportunities for skills rehearsal
