Open AccessAssessing Community Readiness for Preventing Youth Substance Use in Colombia: a Latent Profile Analysis
Author(s) -
Arthur de Oliveira Corrêa,
Eric C. Brown,
Tae Kyoung Lee,
Juliana Mejía-Trujillo,
Augusto Pérez-Gómez,
Nicole Eisenberg
Publication year - 2020
Publication title -
international journal of mental health and addiction
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.702
H-Index - 44
eISSN - 1557-1882
pISSN - 1557-1874
DOI - 10.1007/s11469-019-00191-1
Subject(s) - psychological intervention , health psychology , construct (python library) , confirmatory factor analysis , psychology , construct validity , latent class model , community psychology , applied psychology , environmental health , public health , clinical psychology , medicine , psychometrics , structural equation modeling , nursing , psychiatry , statistics , mathematics , computer science , programming language
The growing use of evidence-based preventive interventions for youth substance use in Latin American countries has prompted governments, researchers, and practitioners to ask if communities are ready for implementing these interventions, especially in light of the elevated costs and long-term commitment necessary for successful implementation. This study explores the construct validity of a measure of community readiness for prevention, using confirmatory factor and latent profile analyses of 7 measures theorized to be indicators of community readiness for implementing preventive interventions for youth substance use. Data were obtained from 211 community leaders in 16 communities in Colombia. Results indicate that community readiness can be represented as a unidimensional construct with multiple profiles of varying levels of readiness. Findings suggest community readiness can be measured adequately as a latent construct and that its indicators can be used diagnostically to assess areas where readiness could be improved for better implementation of evidence-based preventive interventions.