The Online Adaptation and Outcomes of a Family-Based Intervention Addressing Substance Use Disorders

Abstract

Purpose: This article compares outcomes of a family-based prevention program from its original in-person mode to an online mode in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. Celebrating Families!™ is designed to improve parenting skills, family functioning, and family relationships to break the cycle of substance use problems. Method: This mixed-methods, quasi-experimental study compared outcomes of in-person and online treatment conditions and content analysis of open-ended responses to a satisfaction survey. Results: Both groups showed improvement in outcomes, with moderate effect sizes and high satisfaction. Average scores of the online groups were generally lower than the in-person scores. Qualitative data yielded participants’ accounts of improvements in parenting behaviors, family relationships, coping skills, and knowledge insights. Conclusions: Despite the contexts of COVID-19, findings provided evidence that such relational group interventions can be feasibly administered online and can effect changes required to break the cycle of substance use problems and adverse family experiences.

Responses to COVID-19 in Major Social Work Journals: A Systematic Review of Empirical Studies, Comments, and Editorials

“…Social workers were required to have a paradigm shift in adopting ICT to deliver formal service by having diverse ICT options, a client-driven approach, and creativity (Mishna, Milne, Bogo, & Pereira, 2020). Practice examples included the following: telehealth in an Australian child adolescent mental health clinic (de Kam, 2020); an online family-based prevention program in the US (Cohen & Tisch, 2021); virtual social work care with older black adults in Canada (Giwa, Mullings, & Karki, 2020); a social media campaign in Lebanon titled “Humans discriminate, Viruses don’t” (Badran, 2020); and the use of the Internet to care for cadets by military social workers in Taiwan (Chiu & Yu, 2020). Technology training and creative strategies would be necessary for social workers to assist older adults in learning and using new telehealth and social engagement technologies (Gibson et al, 2020).…”

Retrospective Self-Reports of How Adolescent Substance Use Changed with the COVID-19 Pandemic

“…A recent longitudinal adolescent study in US found that before COVID-19, almost all parents forbade adolescent drinking with the family, but data collected during the lockdown showed that 1 in 6 allowed it [ 17 ], with parents who drank heavily being more lenient in allowing adolescent drinking during lockdown. Interventions to support parental alcohol use could have secondary benefits to children’s health, and family-based interventions could be an effective treatment option for addressing substance use in both parents and adolescents [ 18 , 19 ].…”

Implementing Evidence-Based Preventive Interventions During a Pandemic

“…Beyond service delivery, purveyors and developers may find that certain core components cannot be delivered remotely, leading to adaptations that compromise the essential activities proven necessary to achieve intended outcomes. Furthermore, Cohen and Tisch ( 2021 ) noted that shifting from in-person to an online model is not a simple undertaking; adopting a virtual approach requires a high level of technical skill for interventions to still be effective.…”

“…Second, there is a need for research on the processes and outcomes of adapting interventions originally designed for in-person interaction to an online mode (Cohen & Tisch, 2021 ). Intervention developers and other researchers should be designing outcome evaluations to examine whether these translational efforts undermined intervention integrity.…”

“…Third, as discussed previously, shifting from in-person to online dissemination is not a simple undertaking. Intervention providers need to consider expanding the technical skills and expertise of their teams to be able to effectively implement and manage delivery in this new environment of online training and/or dissemination of services (Cohen & Tisch, 2021 ).…”