Viewpoint: Negative results: Any applied value?

Abstract

For practitioners seeking applied research findings to guide their work, the recent issue of Journal of Primary Prevention (Volume 7, No. 2, Winter, 1986) may have been a disappointment. Negative results were prominent, and we all know that negative results are hard to publish, difficult to build programs (or careers) on, and just plain disappointing. For example, the Rooney-Rebeck and Jason article, "Preventing Prejudice in Elementary School Students." A peer tutoring intervention increased interethnic associations in 1st graders but not in 3rd graders. Academic measures showed no advantage for participants vs. controls. Classroom adjustment measures showed controls improved more than experimental subjects. (The authors choose to consider the glass half full in their discussion. For purposes of this discussion, I'll view the glass as half empty.) Take Walther's study on wife abuse prevention. Male high schoolers who viewed a wife abuse film had post-film att i tude ratings no differ~nt from randomly assigned control subjects who viewed a neutral film. Conclusions were that viewing one film was not a potent atti tude change intervention, and that information alone may not be an adequate intervention. The candor of the author is refreshing; I am not sure the results are surprising. Take the Dielman, Shope, Butchart, and Campanelli (1986) article on an elementary school program to prevent adolescent alcohol misuse. Fifth and sixth graders were given four sessions of training on "immediate effects of alcohol, risks of alcohol misuse, and social pressures to misuse alcohol. Social skills to resist peer pressure to misuse alcohol were emphasized." At post-test, self-reports of alcohol use/misuse were no different in students at randomly assigned program and control schools. The authors acknowledge tha t due to low base rates of alcohol use at tha t age, program-control differences were not expected until follow-up some years later.