The Training Process
- Students attend the school computer lab to participate individually (or with the use of a big screen can participate in the program as a group.) The program is divided into 3 modules; each one lasting approximately 45-50 minutes in duration. Students view each module and answer questions about each of the characters appearing in the vignette. Risky Business is a universal model, based on maturation and development and as a result all students are eligible to participate.
- Students internalize the content of the intervention. Research Evidence: Students exhibit shifts in empathy as a result of exposure to the program on post-test assessment.
- Trained students disseminate the new social norms throughout the school by cross-pollination or with untrained students. Research Evidence: Secondary exposure by trained students has an impact on the empathy patterns and peer perceptions of untrained students in the same class environment.
- The school climate improves over time. Research Evidence: Longitudinal samples of cohorts in the same school respond differently to the intervention, indicating measurable shifts in social norms. These differences are based on the unique “risk profile” identified in baseline data.
The Risky Business Curriculum Synopsis
Risky Business is structured around a video dramatization performed by a troupe of students. After watching each scene, participants complete assessment scales of the characters. They record their “private voices” as the soap opera unfolds. The scales measure their perceptions of the peers in the video and their inner reactions to them.
After completing the scales each student receives feedback on his/her responses.
Following this, Dr. Dranoff, a psychologist and program developer conducts interviews with each student/actor in the video; introducing the three skills of empathy. Students follow the different actors in each scene, learning about how they perceive the risky situation and most importantly, how each will handle the risk.
At the conclusion of watching the entire soap opera, students, over time, will have the opportunity to work with their classroom teacher in using prepared role plays to reinforce their understanding of risky situations, and how to use the three skills of empathy (‘cues,’ ‘pulling the curtain,’ and ‘shifting) to better read their peers and develop better self-protection skills against bullying, sexual harassment and violence.
The dramatization
The middle school version has three vignettes. The initial middle school vignette deals with peer pressure. We find five boys gathered together outside of school. One of the boys, Mikey, pushes Weston, whose parents will be out of town, to host a party. Steven then encourages his friends to invite Abbey, who is “going with” Collin, a member of a rival peer group. At his friend’s bidding, John, invites her as the only girl.
The second vignette, involves social-sexual risk-taking. Abbey, debates what to do about the invitation to the party with her friends. Jessica, and Lauren push Abbey to go to the party while Fatima and Carolina try to stop her.
The third vignette deals with violence and focuses on Quentin, and his peer group: Austin, John, Glen, and Collin. Quentin expresses consternation that John invited Abbey to Westin’s party. Collin presents his problem with Weston to the group. John pushes his friends to fight, and Glen seconds this.