Center Grant

Environmental Approaches to Prevention
Principal Investigator: Paul J. Gruenewald, Ph.D.

In its 26th year of operation, the Prevention Research Center (PRC) was awarded additional funding by the US National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism as an Alcohol Research Center. This new Center grant includes three interrelated projects designed to enhance understanding of the role that social and physical environments play in determining how people use alcohol and the kinds of problems they experience related to alcohol. In particular, the focus of the Center is on how social mechanisms act as intermediary variables between the environment and a variety of outcomes including drinking and drunken driving, child abuse and neglect and underage drinking. Additional grants funded individually leverage Center grant resources to expand our understanding of these interrelationships to other problem behaviors including intimate partner violence and smoking.

Administrative Core
Component Director: Paul J. Gruenewald, Ph.D.

The Administrative Core of the Prevention Research Center performs the essential organizational and administrative functions for the entire center, supporting the infrastructure critical to the goals and aims of PRC, for the period from December 1, 2007 – November 30, 2012. The administrative time of the Principal Investigator, Scientific Director, Executive Assistant, and GIS Specialist are contained within this Core. The Core has coordinating responsibility over all center grant research components as well as other funded research projects not a part of the Center Grant.  Scientific standards and public awareness are primary functions of the Core. The Core maintains a time series data archive and supports the library.  In addition, it sponsors travel to scientific meetings for presentation of research papers.  Alcohol prevention is multidisciplinary, so the Center cannot function in isolation.  PRC staff members are involved in a range of activities designed to create a scientific base for public discussion about alcohol issues and to contribute to awareness and rational public debate. The major external functions of the Core support participation in scientific and professional meetings, conference sponsorship, consultation, participation in advisory groups, expert panels or direct technical assistance, providing testimony, research review, editorial review, professional associations, and training.

The Core has responsibility for internal (to PRC) and external functions. Major internal functions of the Core include:

• Executive function
• Administrative Support function
• Computer/Statistical Support function
• Research Reference Support function

Research Components

Researchers and policy makers have long been aware of the health and social problems related to alcohol use. Alcohol related traffic crashes, of course, are a visible and well-known consequence of the risky or inappropriate use of alcohol. Other alcohol problems also have costly and sometimes tragic consequences, including other accidental injuries, child abuse and neglect, violence, risky sexual behavior, addiction, and chronic disease. The studies in the current Center are designed to deepen our understanding of the mechanisms by which community environments affect alcohol consumption and related problems.  By having a more detailed grasp of why and how certain community characteristics affect drinking and  the kinds of problems that result from drinking, policy makers can do a better job of making community environments healthier.  
 
In this five-year grant, PRC is carrying out research in 50 California communities.  These 50  mid-sized communities with populations between 50,000 and 500,000 were selected to represent a range of geographic and demographic characteristics.  In addition, a dissemination component is working with four test communities to determine the most effective mechanisms for translating scientific findings into effective community implementation. The Center grant projects focus on four important topics:

1. How local laws, policies and enforcement affect underage drinking
2. How the number and location of bars and restaurants that serve alcohol affect drinking and driving
3. How the number and location of places that sell alcohol, including both bars and restaurants and stores, affect the number of children who are abused or neglected by their parents.
4. How the findings from this research can best be disseminated at the community level

Additional individual projects interrelated with the Center grant projects that are also based in the 50 California communities address:

1. How the establishment and implementation of local policies about tobacco use and sales affects smoking by young people.
2. How the number and location of places that sell alcohol, including both bars and restaurants and stores, along with other neighborhood characteristics, affects aggressive behavior between intimate partners.

Each of these projects focuses on a serious social problem with potentially tragic consequences.  Each of these projects will enhance our understanding of how these problems can be prevented and is designed ultimately to provide local communities with the knowledge and tools to create healthier environments for its residents. 

The studies are described in more detail below.

The Social Ecology of Drinking and Driving:  A Two Population Model

Social Mechanisms of Child Physical Abuse and Neglect

Local Alcohol Policies, Enforcement, and Underage Drinking

Dissemination and Adoption of Science-Based Prevention

Related Individually Funded Studies

Local Tobacco Policies, Enforcement, and Youth Smoking

Neighborhoods, Alcohol Outlets and Intimate Partner Violence