Evaluation of a Decision-Making Curriculum for Teaching Adolescents with Disabilities to Resist Negative Peer Pressure.
A six-week classroom curriculum lifts teens' ability to resist negative peer pressure.
01Research in Context
What this study did
Khemka et al. (2016) tested a classroom program called PEER-DM. The goal was to help teens with disabilities say no to bad peer pressure.
They randomly split 46 middle-schoolers into two groups. One group got the lessons right away. The other group waited.
The lessons happened in a self-contained classroom twice a week for six weeks.
What they found
Kids who got PEER-DM scored much higher on decision-making tests. They also saw risky situations more clearly.
The wait-list group did not improve. After the study, they got the lessons too.
How this fits with other research
Eisenhower et al. (2006) reviewed many school programs and said universal skills training is promising but not yet solid. PEER-DM adds a fresh RCT result for teens with disabilities.
Dukhayyil et al. (1973) showed that teens need external tokens to cut disruptive acts. PEER-DM flips the focus from teacher tokens to student choices, yet both studies sit in the same self-contained rooms.
Killeen (1995) argued we must fix whole-school climate to stop antisocial acts. PEER-DM zooms in on one classroom, so the papers complement, not clash.
Why it matters
If you run a middle-school special-ed class, you now have a short, ready-made script to boost refusal skills. Slide PEER-DM into your schedule, track decision-making probes, and watch teens spot traps faster.
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02At a glance
03Original abstract
This study was designed to assess the impact of a decision-making curriculum (PEER-DM) on the social peer relationship knowledge and self-protective decision-making skills of adolescents with disabilities in hypothetical situations involving negative peer pressure. A randomized design was used to assign students with disabilities from self-contained special education classes to an intervention group (n = 22) or a wait-list control group (n = 20). ANCOVA analyses, using pretest scores as covariates, indicated that students who were trained on PEER-DM had significantly higher effective decision-making action and correct risk perception scores, relative to participants in the control group. This study provides supporting evidence that PEER-DM is a promising intervention for students with disabilities, including those with identified autism spectrum disorders, during transition years to help them develop a better understanding of positive and negative peer relationships and learn systematic decision-making skills for improved handling of social situations in the school and community, especially situations involving negative peer pressure. The study adds credence to using systematic, strategy-based decision making interventions designed to address the cognitive, emotional and motivational processes underlying adolescent decision making in sensitive interpersonal situations involving peer pressure. The study points to the lack of preparedness to handle situations of negative peer pressure as a serious social and health risk for adolescents with disabilities that deserves urgent and concerted attention in transition services programming. Implications for future curriculum-development efforts and replication of treatment findings are discussed. Future research examining disability-specific patterns of decision-making in peer situations and comparisons with typically developing populations is recommended.
Journal of autism and developmental disorders, 2016 · doi:10.1007/s10803-016-2770-0