Factors That Influence the Effectiveness of Primary Prevention of Substance Use: A Review of Reviews

Context: The fact that substance use may result in dependence and severe harm to the user and the community has led to serious and extensive endeavors to design and implement preventive interventions. Prevention programs, however, have been shown to have different effects, and that should not be taken for granted. Systematic reviews and meta-analyses in the field have tried to reveal the effects of different types of substance use prevention programs and to identify the influencing factors. Objectives: The purpose of the current review was to more accurately identify factors associated with the effectiveness of interventions or reversal of desired effects. Evidence Acquisition: We systematically reviewed systematic review and meta-analyses studies within the period of 2009 - 2019 that reported the effectiveness of substance use prevention programs. After the systematic screening of 1586 articles, 43 articles were finally reviewed. Results: In preparation for extracting our data, we designed a structural model for analyzing the results of research on the effectiveness of substance use prevention programs. In general, universal types of prevention programs were reported as more effective than the two other types of selective and indicated programs. Regarding the context of programs, the school setting was more effective than others. In the case of interventions performed in the family setting, selective programs were more effective. Interventions provided by specialists were more effective than those provided by laypeople and / or peers. Interventions provided by more than one person and from more than one discipline showed higher effectiveness. Conclusions: Based on our structural design, we feel that further studies are needed to extend our knowledge regarding the effectiveness of substance use prevention programs.