An initial evaluation of the Fast Track program.

Conduct Problems Prevention Research Group. (1996). An initial evaluation of the Fast Track program. In J.A. Linney (Ed.), Proceedings of the Fifth National Prevention Research Conference (pp. 54-56). National Institute of Mental Health.

Abstract: The Fast Track project is predicated on a developmental model that assumes long-term prevention of children's antisocial behavior will be achieved by enhancing immediate competencies among the children and their parents and teachers. This paper describes the outcomes of the first intensive period of intervention, during the transition at school entry in the first grade year. The results of the first year indicate strong and consistent evidence for better social skills and more positive peer relations as a result of the intervention, with some indication of fewer conduct problems. Intervention children also developed better basic reading skills and better social and emotional coping skills than the control children. Intervention parents demonstrated more positive involvement in their children's schools and more effective discipline strategies, as well as more positive relations with their children. If these positive findings are maintained over the life course of these children, the guiding developmental theory leads us to expect that the intervention children will demonstrate fewer conduct problems in adolescence than control children.