Abstract
A growing emphasis on the utilization of empirically supported treatments for drug abuse and other psychiatric disorders (Barlow, 1996; SAMHSA, 2001) has also led to a need to specify treatments that have been developed and tested with Hispanics. Chambless and Hollon (1998, pp. 7–18) define empirically supported treatments as “clearly specified psychological treatments shown to be efficacious in controlled research with a delineated population.” This and similar definitions have raised questions about the extent to which the “delineated populations” have consisted of large groups of minority clients (Bernal & Scharron-Del-Rio, 2001). In this chapter we will argue that (a) there is a severe shortage of empirically supported substance abuse treatment models that have been fully tested with Hispanics or that incorporate research on cultural processes; (b) that many of the commonly used ideas of cultural competence continue to be distal to the treatment processes therapists encounter and, therefore, often difficult to transfer to the front lines of practice; and (c) that the treatment-development mechanism (Rounsaville, Carroll, & Onken, 2001) can be a powerful tool for designing interventions for minority groups by systematically integrating findings on cultural processes with a treatment's theoretical change mechanisms. Based on this line of thought, we present an ongoing treatment development effort designed to produce an enhanced family-based treatment model with several innovative characteristics (e.g., a flexible treatment manual and thematic/psychoeducational modules) that facilitate the tailoring of the intervention package to the needs of each Hispanic adolescent/family.
