PUBLICATIONS

Prevention Institute Articles

Aging and Mobility: Current Issues
This article frames current issues related to traffic safety, mobility, and aging, examines factors that influence transportation options and use, and discusses efforts and strategies for enhancing safe mobility for seniors.

Child Occupant Protection: Current Issues
Discusses current trends and issues related to child safety seat technology, legislation, and use.

Comprehensive Prevention: Improving Health Outcomes through Practice
      Published in Minority Health Today, this article examines the role of prevention in reducing health disparities and improving health outcomes.
Also available as PDF

Conflict Resolution and Violence Prevention: From Misunderstanding to Understanding
      Published in The Fourth R, this article is designed to increase the understanding of the relationship between conflict resolution and violence prevention.
Also available as PDF

Developing Effective Coalitions: An Eight Step Guide
      Published in Mary Ellen Wurzbach's Community Health Education and Promotion: A Guide to Program Design and Evaluation, this document can be used by communities as a tool for building and sustaining successful collaborations.
Also available as PDF

Is Junk Food the Next Tobacco?
    This op-ed piece, originally published in the Oakland Tribune, June 8, 2003, highlights several ways that the law can be applied to take on the food industry.

Nutrition Policy Profiles
    Published within the Center for Health Improvement's Health Policy Coach as part of a collection of prevention-focused policies, these profiles offer policy recommendations and model practices related to improving nutrition and health.

Primary Prevention and Child Abuse: Fostering Supportive Environments for Families
Published in the June 2003 Child Abuse Training and Technical Assistance newsletter, this brief article gives an introduction to the primary prevention of child abuse and delineates some suggested activities.
Available as PDF

A Public Health Approach to the Violence Epidemic in the United States
    Published in Environment and Urbanization, this article describes the dimensions and root causes of America's violence problem and proposes a community-based public health approach to violence prevention.
Also available as PDF

RCPs' Role in Primary Smoking Prevention Programs
    Published in RT Magazine, this article uses the Spectrum of Prevention as a guide for developing smoking prevention programs and discusses actions that respiratory care practitioners (RCPs) can take to prevent respiratory disease.

Seatbelts: Current Issues
This article provides background on the evolution of seatbelt technology and laws, and discusses current issues related to seatbelt use.

The Spectrum of Prevention: Developing a Comprehensive Approach to Injury Prevention
      Published in Injury Prevention, this article delineates the Spectrum of Prevention and illustrates its application to injury and violence prevention. The article also emphasizes the importance of changes in policies and norms to enhance the effectiveness of prevention initiatives.
Also available as PDF

Sweet Charity? Emergency Food and the End of Entitlement
      A book review published in Community Food Security News.

What Works in Reducing Impaired Driving
This article discusses current trends and issues related to impaired driving prevention.

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Prevention Institute Reports

Beyond Brochures: Preventing Alcohol-Related Violence and
Injuries
    A guide to preventing intentional and unintentional alcohol-related injuries by using the "Spectrum of Prevention" methodology.

Boys Will Be Men Resource Guide
    Developed in part to accompany Tom Weidlinger's documentary, Boys Will Be Men, this guide provides information on youth development, preventing violence towards women and children, and organizations and groups working to improve men's and boys' health and well being.

Collaboration Math: Enhancing the Effectiveness of Multidisciplinary Collaboration
    Collaboration Math describes the application of this Prevention Institute tool at the University of California Berkeley's Traffic Safety Center, illustrating how multidisciplinary groups can use this tool to increase effective collaboration.
Available as PDF

Cultivating Peace In Salinas: A Framework for Violence Prevention
    Developed for the City of Salinas, California, Cultivating Peace provides a snapshot of the city's assets and needs and delineates strategy recommendations for reducing violence and enhancing community well being.
To view a Spanish translation of this document, please visit partners-for-peace.org.
Also available as PDF - Executive Summary

Eliminating Health Disparities: The Role of Primary Prevention
A paper describing how health disparities can be reduced through systems-based prevention strategies that address the underlying factors influencing health.
Available as PDF

First Steps: Taking Action Early To Prevent Violence
The First Steps report presents research and recommendations related to effective violence prevention efforts for children 0-5 years of age. Download the PDF version of the report, or order a printed version.
Available as PDF - Order report

Growing the Next Generation: Strategies to Improve Nutrition and Child Development in Los Angeles County
      Originally developed for Los Angeles County, this paper's recommendations and strategies for improving early childhood nutrition are relevant and applicable to communities everywhere.
Also available as PDF

Health For All: California's Strategic Approach to Eliminating Racial and Ethnic Health Disparities
    People of color in California consistently face higher rates of morbidity and mortality than whites. By analyzing the pathways from root factors to illness and injury experienced by people of color, the necessary actions to prevent these medical conditions are illuminated.
Complete Paper Available as PDF - Executive Summary Available as PDF

Improving the Nutrition and Physical Activity Environment in California
    A paper describing the current state of the nutrition and physical activity environment, and target issues for action.
Also available as PDF

Kids' Plates: The Spectrum of Prevention for Childhood & Adolescent Injury Prevention
    This paper offers examples of child and adolescent injury projects for each of the six levels of the Spectrum of Prevention.

Preventing and Reducing School Violence Fact Sheets
    With support from Children's Safety Network, Prevention Institute developed a set of school violence prevention fact sheets in September 2001.

Rebuilding after September 11, 2001: Constructive Actions to Support Health and a Return to Well Being
    Developed after the September 11 terrorist attacks, this paper provides suggestions for coping with a tragedy of that magnitude and for promoting individual and community well being in general.
Also available as PDF

SafeUSA Focus Forum findings
    This report presents the findings of community forums held to bring local and regional perspectives to SafeUSA's development of a national unified injury and violence prevention strategy.
Also available as PDF

Shifting the Focus: An Interdisciplinary Framework for Advancing Violence Prevention
    "Shifting the Focus" is a California initiative to enhance collaboration between the Departments of Health, Education, and Justice in state violence prevention efforts. This report documents barriers and areas of potential collaboration identified by leaders in violence prevention at a two-day forum.

Shifting the Focus: Changing the Way Government Does Business to Prevent Violence in California
    A document describing the history, background, objectives, and activities of the "Shifting the Focus" initiative.

Shifting the Focus: From the Margins to the Middle
    A report delineating strategy recommendations for more effective statewide violence prevention through the Shifting the Focus partnership.
Also available as PDF - Executive Summary

Shifting the Focus: A Local Call to State Action
    A report presenting the findings of community hearings in California held to learn about the successes and challenges local violence prevention practitioners and decision-makers experience working with State government.
Also available as PDF - Executive Summary

Shifting the Focus: Accomplishments and Lessons Learned
    Delineates the accomplishments of a State interdisciplinary partnership to support local violence prevention efforts. The report describes major efforts and methodologies and documents the lessons learned over the course of the initiative.
Available as PDF

Strategies for Action: Integrating Nutrition and Physical Activity Promotion to Reach Low-Income Californians
    Developed for the Cancer Prevention and Nutrition Section of California's Department of Health Services, this report describes how physical activity promotion can be integrated into efforts to improve the nutrition of California families with low incomes.
Also available as PDF

The Tension of Turf: Making it Work for the Coalition
    The Tension of Turf builds on earlier work of Prevention Institute which described the coalition start-up process in Developing Effective Coalitions: An Eight Step Guide. The Tension of Turf paper was developed in response to something commonly experienced within coalitions: turf struggle. The document explores turf issues that commonly arise among coalition members and offers a set of recommendations for limiting the negative aspects of turf struggles.
Available as PDF

Traffic Safety in Communities of Color
    This paper highlights major traffic safety needs within specific communities of color, and concludes that ongoing data collection and analysis are necessary to provide a clearer, more complete picture of the issue as well as to inform interventions and efforts targeted toward these communities. More research is needed to understand past traffic safety successes (such as the decreases in impaired driving or increases in seat belt use that have occurred across ethnic groups) so that these successes can be extended. Similarly, evaluations of current interventions are greatly needed, particularly for comprehensive and longitudinal studies. Finally, there is also a need for research that distinguishes the effects of ethnicity versus the effects of socioeconomic status on traffic safety outcomes.