Wednesday, April 2, 2025
4/2/2025
A digital health intervention to increase condom use among adolescent sexual minority males - PROJECT SUMMARY/ABSTRACT Career Goal: I am committed to a career as an independent research scientist contributing to the design, implementation, and evaluation of interventions to improve sexual health among adolescents, and reduce disparities in health outcomes. Career Development: This K99/R00 Award will provide an additional period of mentored training to support my transition to an independent investigator by the end of the K99 phase. My training objectives are to: (1) master methodological strategies for conducting formative research necessary for health intervention adaptation and tailoring; (2) gain a proficient understanding of adolescent sexual minority male (ASMM) health and sexual assertiveness training needs; (3) identify core principles and applications of implementation science to successfully conduct a clinical trial with an effectiveness-implementation hybrid design; and (4) develop skills and expertise to facilitate a successful transition into a fully independent research scientist, including those needed to conduct randomized controlled trials of behavioral interventions. Research Project: ASMM are at disproportionately high risk for acquiring HIV/STIs and report lower rates of condom use compared to their heterosexual peers. Assertive sexual communication is associated with higher rates of condom use among adolescents; however, ASMM do not receive adequate information or skills about sexual assertiveness. The purpose of this research is to adapt an existing digital health intervention, originally designed to provide a general population of teens with information about sexual consent, to include a focus on condom negotiation and tailor content specifically for ASMM. The project has two Specific Aims: (1) adapt the sexual consent intervention (PACT) to serve as skills-based sexual assertiveness and condom negotiation training for ASMM; and (2) evaluate the adapted PACT intervention among ASMM in an effectiveness- implementation hybrid design. Mentorship: I have assembled a dedicated mentoring team of experts to provide ongoing guidance on my proposed research and training activities. This team includes a primary mentor (Dr. Eric Walsh-Buhi, Department of Applied Health Science, Indiana University School of Public Health-Bloomington [IU SPH-B]), a secondary mentor (Dr. Kathryn Macapagal, Department of Medical Social Sciences, Northwestern University’s Feinberg School of Medicine), and a panel of scientific advisors in the Department of Applied Health Science at IU SPH-B (Drs. Kristen Jozkowski, Karla Galaviz, and Debby Herbenick). Future Directions: Skills and data acquired from this proposal will support a future R01 proposal to conduct further trials of PACT.
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