Effects of a culturally congruent intervention on cognitive factors related to drug-use recovery

This paper describes a culturally congruent intervention to promote recover y from illegal drug use among African Americans and reports initial, outcom es. The intervention was based on the transtheoretical stages-of-change mod el and on techniques of focused dyadic counseling and motivational intervie wing. Subjects were randomly assigned to the culturally congruent intervent ion or to a control condition. Each condition featured a single counseling session during which drug-related and other needs were assessed and appropr iate referrals offered. Posttest data indicated that subjects in the cultur ally congruent condition were more involved in the counseling session, more willing to self-disclose, more motivated to seek help for drug-use-associa ted problems, and higher on preparation for change.