Peer-reviewed article
Using Intervention Mapping to Develop, Implement, and Evaluate a Community Engaged Crime Reduction Intervention.
Stager CG, Whitfield S, Nassel A, Irby H, Wood M et al. ·
Summary
Written by AI, not yet AICS's view · claude-haiku-4-5-20251001This study developed and evaluated a community-designed violence prevention program called Building a Better Bessemer in Alabama. The program targeted young people and their families through social-emotional learning, mentoring, parental support, and community projects. Youth showed improvements in social cohesion and reductions in conduct problems and overall difficulties after the program.
Key points
- The intervention was co-designed with the community using a participatory research approach
- Youth reported significant improvement in social cohesion (p = 0.009)
- Conduct problems decreased significantly (p < 0.001) among youth participants
- Total difficulties decreased significantly (p < 0.003)
- Community members reported strong support for the program's content and delivery
Limitations
The study uses pre-post measurement without a comparison or control group, so we cannot determine whether observed changes were caused by the program or by other factors. The document does not report demographic characteristics of participants, follow-up duration, or attrition rates.
Abstract
This study aimed to develop, implement, and evaluate a multi-level violence prevention initiative codesigned with the community in Bessemer, Alabama. Guided by a community-based participatory research approach, we developed "Building a Better Bessemer," a holistic intervention targeting violent crime at the socio-ecological levels (individual, relational, community, and societal levels) through intervention mapping. The intervention included youth social-emotional learning, mentoring, parental support, police engagement, and community improvement projects. Evaluation included pre-post surveys and focus groups. Among youth self-reported outcomes, significant improvements were seen in social cohesion (p = 0.009) and decreases in conduct problems (p < 0.001) and total difficulties (p < 0.003). Focus group results reported strong support for the program's content and delivery. Community-driven, multi-level violence prevention interventions are feasible and effective in communities with high crime and show promising outcomes in youth behavior and community safety.
Findings the Hub has extracted
Each claim below is labelled by its type of design and links back to this report.
- Intervention
- Building a Better Bessemer - a multi-level violence prevention program including youth social-emotional learning, mentoring, parental support, police engagement, and community improvement projects
- Population
- Youth and families in Bessemer, Alabama, a community with high crime
Key finding
Social cohesion among youth improved significantly (p = 0.009)