SARG Worksheet 1: Assessment Committee Roles and Responsibilities

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SARG Worksheet 1 Assessment Committee Roles and
Responsibilities
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SARG Worksheet 2 Identify Consequence(s) of
Prioritized Substance Use Problem For the
substance use problem your community prioritized
(e.g. underage alcohol use, adult heavy/binge
drinking, youth inhalant use), consider the
consequences that are resulting from this
substance use behavior in your community.
Identify the drug (alcohol or inhalants), the
consequences resulting from this use and provide
at least one data source that supports that the
consequence results from the substance use
behavior indicated.
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SARG Worksheet 3 Identify Characteristics of the
Population at Risk Identify the populations and
the drug using behaviors that contribute to the
consequence problem. You may need to consult
with local experts from the Medical Examiners
Office, emergency rooms, and law enforcement, the
Public Health Department, Schools, etc. who are
most knowledgeable about the drug related
consequence. Based on your understanding of the
drug use behavior(s) most related to the
consequence. Use data from FYSAS and local other
behavior surveys to identify the characteristics
of the populations engaged in these behaviors.
Understanding the characteristics of the
populations at risk is important for identifying
the root causes of the problem as well as for
identifying the most relevant and effective
interventions.
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Intervening Variables for Youth and Adult Alcohol
Use/Consequences

• Enforcement includes the enforcement of the
  rules, laws and policies surrounding substance
  use and its consequences, as well as the public
  perception of the levels of enforcement and how
  likely people are to believe they will get caught
  if they violate the rules, laws and policies.
• Retail access/availability refers to the
  accessibility of alcohol, tobacco and drugs from
  retail sources (i.e., where money is
  exchanged.1 Examples are the ability of
  underage youth to obtain alcohol from stores as
  well as the ease of purchasing alcohol for
  adults and, the sale of drug paraphernalia, such
  as rolling papers.
• Social access/availability refers the access one
  has to substances through social networks. In
  this case money is rarely exchanged. For
  example, parents who throw house parties provide
  social access to alcohol for youth.
• Price refers to economic availability such as
  special deals and discounts for alcohol in
  particular, such as 2 for 1 specials or
  discounted happy hour prices.
• Promotion attempts to increase the
  attractiveness of drinking, smoking or using
  illicit drugs.2 It can include advertising
  that promotes excessive, illegal and/or unsafe
  use as well as sponsorship of events that promote
  excessive, illegal and/or unsafe use.
• Social norms are informal standards or values
  regarding the acceptability or unacceptability of
  certain behaviors including substance use.3
• Family norms include parental attitudes towards
  substances (e.g. kids will be kids), parental
  monitoring and involvement, parental/sibling use
  of substances.
• Community/peer norms include attitudes of peers
  and adults in the community towards substance use
  (e.g. belief that most people drink/use drugs or
  that social events must include substances),
  peer/community use of substances, and the
  perceived social benefits of substance use (the
  coolness factor).
• Perceived risk - if individuals do not feel
  substance use poses a great risk, they tend to
  underestimate the potential consequences. For
  example, if individuals believe that they wont
  get in a crash while driving under the influence,
  they may be more likely to engage in that
  behavior.

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SARG Worksheet 4 Brainstorm Local Contributing
Factors Based on the data you have available to
assess each intervening variable in your county,
identify those that appear problematic. These
may be higher than the state or similar counties
or trending upward. For each intervening variable
of concern, note its problem and a supportive
data source, list POSSIBLE factors that are
contributing to these conditions in your county.
As you brainstorm possible contributing factors,
be sure to consider the specific nature of the
population involved in the problem, and the
times, places and settings where the substance
use and consequences are occurring.
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SARG Worksheet 5 Identify Local Contributing
Factors and Measures Using your teams
brainstormed list of contributing factors from
Worksheet 4, identify how your team would measure
the extent of each factor, the source of the
data, and the method used to collect the data.
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SARG Worksheet 6 Initial Local Logic
Model Complete the logic model below, indicating
the substance use behavior and related
consequence, the intervening variables that you
have identified with data as problems in your
county, and the local factors that are
contributing to each intervening variable. Copy
the arrows and place them between the local
contributing factors and the intervening
variables they influence in your county. You may
also want to insert arrows between intervening
variables and contributing factors if you believe
they are influencing one another. Select and
delete any unneeded boxes.
Local Contributing Factors
Substance Use Behavior
Substance Related Consequence
Intervening Variables
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