PC2012: Teens Talk Back: An Innovative School-based Competition for Teens to Create Public Service Announcements That Prevent Opioid Abuse

Background: Adolescents and young adults live in a world impacted by the opioid epidemic. Early education may increase knowledge, prevent future use, and support youth living with someone struggling with addiction. Our hypothesis was that, through engaging high school students’ creativity in the creation of a public service announcement (PSA) on opioid prevention and education, we could increase their knowledge and awareness of the risks of opioid addiction.

Methods: Tenth grade students at a local high school were asked to complete a brief de-identified survey on their knowledge about and attitudes toward the use of opioids. Students were then tasked with producing their own PSA videos about the opioid epidemic as part of their health class. Videos were scored on theme, content, creativity, and quality, with cash prizes offered for winning selections. After completion of the PSA campaign, students completed an identical post-intervention survey. Survey questions were adapted from the nationally administered and validated Monitoring the Future and Youth Risk Behavior surveys. Pearson’s Chi-squared test and the Wilcoxon rank sum test were performed using R statistical software (Version 4.1.2).

Results: 354 students aged 14-18 years completed the pre-intervention survey and 328 students completed the post-intervention survey. Most answers to questions assessing knowledge and attitudes about opioid use did not significantly change between the pre- and post-PSA surveys. Students did not demonstrate an increased knowledge about addictive drugs on the post-PSA survey. However, following the PSA project, students did show significantly increased awareness about the availability and low cost of drugs (p =0.003) and increasingly acknowledged popularity as a motivation for using illicit drugs (p=0.054).

Conclusion: This school-based PSA competition program led to changes in attitudes about factors which predisposed adolescents to use opioids or other illicit drugs. Specifically, following the PSA competition, students rated popularity and low cost as more important factors in influencing the decision to use illegal drugs. Survey data did not reveal a significant change in knowledge or personal opinions about opioids or other illegal drugs after creating PSAs. It is possible that these students already have a high baseline knowledge about opioids. Moreover, surveys may not capture the more nuanced benefits of the project on student attitudes toward opioid use. Next steps for this project will include tracking the widespread dissemination of the winning PSAs to assess the broader impact of engaging youth creativity in the production of these moments of learning.