Friend to Friend: A Randomized Trial for Urban African American Relationally Aggressive Girls.

Abstract

To determine the effectiveness of the Friend to Friend (F2F) aggression intervention through a clinical trial with urban African American girls. A randomized parallel-group study design was conducted comparing the effectiveness of F2F to an attention control condition (called Homework Study Skills and Organization, HSO) among relationally aggressive girls from six urban low-income elementary schools. Analyses of covariance were utilized for comparing post-test measurement between the two conditions while adjusting for pre-test measurement. For those outcomes with significant intervention effects between the two conditions at post-test, we examined whether the effects were maintained from post-test to follow-up among girls in the F2F group. Results suggest that aggressive girls in F2F decreased their levels of relational aggression and increased their knowledge of social problem solving skills as compared to similar girls randomized to HSO, both of which were maintained at the one-year follow up. Programs developed through extensive partnership-based approaches, such as the F2F Program, may have promise for addressing the needs of urban high-risk girls in an acceptable and culturally-sensitive manner.