Empowerment and Substance Use Prevention among Youth of Color: A Scoping Review

Concerns related to harmful substance use during adolescence continue to persist, and recent trends show racial and ethnic disparities. There is a need to identify effective and culturally responsive prevention approaches focused on communities of color. Innovative approaches to substance use prevention and youth health equity have included those based on youth empowerment and community-based participatory research. The purposes of this review were to incorporate studies that describe youth of color engagement and empowerment in substance use prevention, with a primary emphasis on alcohol use, and to identify related outcome studies.

This scoping review synthesized studies into empowerment-based youth participatory action research and empowerment theory outcome-based studies. Findings describe participant descriptions, objectives, participatory approaches, primary substances of foci, and youth empowerment-based outcomes.

Implications provide guidelines for youth empowerment within substance use prevention programming and recommendations for youth-engaged substance use prevention research. Additional research is needed within the area of alcohol use prevention, specifically.