Communities That Care Youth Survey

1. Abstract

The Communities That Care Youth Survey (CTC-YS) is an epidemiological, public-health-oriented self-report instrument developed by Michael W. Arthur, J. David Hawkins, John A. Pollard, Richard F. Catalano, and A. J. Baglioni Jr. (2002) at the Social Development Research Group (SDRG), University of Washington. Engineered to assess the prevalence of adolescent problem behaviors alongside the specific risk factors and protective factors that predict them, the CTC-YS operationalizes the Social Development Strategy across four fundamental ecological domains: Community, Family, School, and Peer-Individual. The comprehensive questionnaire contains 197 items that measure 31 distinct risk and protective factor constructs, alongside adolescent substance use patterns (including 30-day and lifetime prevalence for alcohol, tobacco, marijuana, and illicit drugs), delinquent behaviors, gang involvement, and school absenteeism. The instrument employs diverse response scales, notably including 4-point Likert scales, frequency counts over specified recall periods (e.g., 30 days, 12 months, lifetime), age-of-onset escalations, and branching anchored response choices (e.g., strong capitalized anchors such as NO!, no, yes, YES!). Psychometric investigations across multi-state statewide cohorts exceeding 70,000 students have repeatedly corroborated its exceptional measurement precision. Internal consistency reliabilities for the multi-item risk and protective factor subscales generally range from α = .65 to α = .89, with mean reliabilities typically surpassing .78 across diverse demographic sub-populations. Confirmatory factor analytic investigations demonstrate robust structural validity, showing stability across sex, race, ethnicity, and grade levels (specifically grades 6 through 12). By delivering reliable epidemiological community profiles, the CTC-YS allows municipal leaders, prevention coalitions, school districts, and public health practitioners to direct formula-funded resources toward empirically validated prevention systems that curb youth substance use, violence, and school dropout.

2. Keywords

Communities That Care Youth Survey, CTC-YS, Social Development Model, risk factors, protective factors, adolescent substance abuse, juvenile delinquency, prevention science, psychometric evaluation, epidemiological surveillance

3. Authors

The Communities That Care Youth Survey was engineered and standardized by leading prevention scientists affiliated with the Social Development Research Group (SDRG), School of Social Work, University of Washington, Seattle, Washington, United States:

• Michael W. Arthur, Ph.D. — Professor and Senior Research Scientist, Social Development Research Group, School of Social Work, University of Washington. Specializes in developmental epidemiology, prevention systems, and community-level interventions.
• J. David Hawkins, Ph.D. — Endowed Professor Emeritus of Prevention, Social Development Research Group, School of Social Work, University of Washington. Co-developer of the Social Development Model and pioneer of evidence-based prevention science.
• John A. Pollard, Ph.D. — Quantitative Methodologist and Research Associate, Social Development Research Group, University of Washington; Vice President of Research, Channing Bete Company. Focuses on psychometric assessment, survey architecture, and longitudinal analysis.
• Richard F. Catalano, Ph.D. — Professor Emeritus and Former Director, Social Development Research Group, School of Social Work, University of Washington. Renowned theorist in positive youth development and social-emotional interventions.
• A. J. Baglioni Jr., Ph.D. — Psychometrician and Quantitative Analyst, Department of Psychiatric Medicine, University of Virginia Health Sciences Center, and former statistical consultant to the Social Development Research Group.

Institutional oversight and updates are managed via the Social Development Research Group (SDRG) at the University of Washington and distributed in collaboration with state behavioral health authorities and the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA).

4. Purpose

The principal objective of the Communities That Care Youth Survey is to provide community coalitions, school districts, public health authorities, and prevention scientists with an empirically sound, localized, and actionable epidemiological assessment profile of adolescent health and behavior. In traditional public health models, surveillance systems often measure outcome disparities—such as hospitalizations, juvenile court referrals, or overdose rates—long after severe dysfunctions have crystallized. The CTC-YS shifts public health surveillance from reactive tracking to proactive, developmentally informed intervention by measuring the underlying causal and correlative conditions: specifically, the risk factors that elevate the probability of negative psychosocial outcomes and the protective factors that buffer against adversity.

From a research application perspective, the CTC-YS was designed to evaluate the Communities That Care (CTC) operating system, an evidence-based prevention model that assists communities in selecting and implementing targeted, empirically supported interventions. To achieve this, the survey captures behavioral endpoints such as the frequency of alcohol consumption, binge drinking, cigarette and smokeless tobacco use, cannabis use, illicit prescription drug misuse, physical violence, weapon carriage, school truancy, and arrest history. Concurrently, it gauges individual vulnerabilities, peer group norms, familial dynamic deficits, and community-wide environmental conditions.

In community and clinical practice, the tool serves three critical functions: Needs Assessment, Resource Allocation, and Longitudinal Evaluation. During needs assessments, the survey quantifies which specific risk factors (e.g., perceived availability of drugs, community disorganization, parental attitudes favorable toward antisocial behavior) are elevated within a school district or township compared to state or national normative benchmarks. In resource allocation, policy stakeholders utilize these localized risk profiles to choose validated programs specifically targeted at those elevated dimensions—avoiding generic or ineffective prevention strategies. Finally, for evaluation, repeated cross-sectional or cohort-sequential administrations allow communities to gauge long-term trajectory changes across population-level adolescent cohorts, establishing whether the deployment of environmental strategies, family interventions, and school-wide positive behavioral programs produce measurable declines in antisocial behavior and substance abuse.

5. Psychological Construct

The CTC-YS operationalizes an extensive multidimensional architecture of risk and protective factors nested within the four ecological domains defined by developmental systems theory. Each subscale within the instrument reflects an established psychological or sociological construct with documented links to adolescent problem behaviors:

1. Community Domain

• Community Disorganization: Assesses perceptions of physical decay, neighborhood deterioration, abandoned structures, graffiti, and public discord (Items 151–154). Higher scores indicate youth immersion in environments lacking structural cohesion and informal social control.
• Availability of Drugs and Handguns: Measures the subjective ease of obtaining alcohol, tobacco, illicit narcotics, and firearms within the local environment (Items 123–127).
• Laws and Norms Favorable to Drug Use and Crime: Assesses youths’ perceptions of municipal enforcement, neighborhood adult tolerance of substance misuse, and the likelihood of police intervention for delinquent actions (Items 128–133).
• Community Rewards and Opportunities for Prosocial Involvement: Operates as a protective dimension measuring whether the community supplies youth with meaningful extra-curricular, civic, and athletic outlets (Items 146–150), along with adult praise, recognition, and subjective safety (Items 138–145).

2. Family Domain

• Poor Family Management: Evaluates structural family deficits, including unclear household rules, absence of parental monitoring, lack of awareness regarding adolescent whereabouts, and inconsistent discipline (Items 171, 173, 175–178, 190, 192).
• Family Conflict: Gauges recurrent emotional friction, verbal hostility, and intense domestic disputes within the household unit (Items 172, 174, 191).
• Parental and Sibling Attitudes Favorable toward Substance Use and Antisocial Behavior: Quantifies the extent to which family members condone or model illegal acts, drug use, weapon carriage, and school failure (Items 155–160, 165–170).
• Family Attachment and Rewards for Involvement: Serves as a vital protective construct assessing the emotional bond between parents and youth, bidirectional communication, collaborative decision-making, and parental affirmation of positive actions (Items 179–189).

3. School Domain

• Academic Failure and Low Commitment to School: Captures subjective and objective indicators of scholastic failure, perceived lack of meaning in curriculum content, chronic disinterest, skipped class time, and school-related alienation (Items 6–13, 22).
• Opportunities and Rewards for Prosocial School Involvement: Measures school-level protective buffers, reflecting whether teachers afford opportunities for active classroom participation, student leadership, one-on-one dialogue, and public praise for academic achievement (Items 14–21, 23).

4. Peer and Individual Domain

• Early Initiation of Problem Behavior: Tracks the precise chronological age at which the respondent first experimented with alcohol, tobacco, marijuana, weapon carrying, or violent confrontations (Items 79–87). Earlier onset is a recognized developmental predictor of persistent life-course antisocial trajectories.
• Peer Delinquency and Sensation Seeking: Assesses affiliation with peers who engage in substance misuse, theft, gang activity, and school dropout (Items 24–34), as well as individual appetites for physiological thrill-seeking and risk-laden experimentation (Items 89, 98–102).
• Favorable Attitudes Toward Problem Behavior and Perceived Risks: Evaluates internal cognitive rationalizations endorsing illicit conduct, perceived social status benefits (“coolness”) derived from deviant acts, and personal assessments of the physical or psychological dangers linked to regular substance use (Items 35–38, 94–97, 103–105, 110–122).
• Interaction with Prosocial Peers and Emotional Well-being: Assesses peer-level protective systems (e.g., best friends who participate in school clubs, value academic success, and commit to being drug-free; Items 193–197) and screens for internalizing distress, including depressive mood and existential despair (Items 90–93).

6. Theoretical Framework

The conceptual foundation of the Communities That Care Youth Survey is anchored in the Social Development Model (SDM), an overarching, integrative developmental framework formulated by J. David Hawkins and Richard F. Catalano (1996). The SDM synthesizes key tenets from three dominant sociological and psychological paradigms: Social Learning Theory (Bandura, 1977), Differential Association Theory (Sutherland, 1947), and Social Control Theory (Hirschi, 1969).

The SDM asserts that youth become bonded to social units (family, school, peer groups, and community) through a developmental sequence initiated by four core conditions: (1) available opportunities for active involvement in prosocial units; (2) actual skills possessed by the youth to successfully participate; (3) clear reinforcement or recognition returned by the social environment; and (4) the formation of affective bonds (attachment and commitment) characterized by a belief in the unit’s shared moral code. When these four elements are oriented toward prosocial institutions, the resulting social bond acts as a protective mediator that promotes prosocial behaviors and curbs delinquent urges.

Conversely, if developmental opportunities, reinforcements, and modeling emanate from antisocial or deviant environments—such as substance-using parents, dislocated neighborhoods, or delinquent peer groups—the youth forms antisocial bonds. These bonds cultivate norms and behavioral repertoires favorable toward substance misuse, aggression, and institutional detachment. The SDM posits that risk factors heighten vulnerabilities by interrupting prosocial bonding or providing reinforcement for antisocial pursuits. Meanwhile, protective factors serve as buffers, moderating the detrimental impacts of environmental stress and high-risk exposures.

Furthermore, the survey integrates Bronfenbrenner’s Ecological Systems Theory. This perspective highlights that youth development is shaped across nested contextual layers, ranging from the immediate microsystem (caregiver-child dynamics, peer dyads) to the mesosystem (family-school coordination), exosystem (neighborhood structural disorganization, drug markets), and macrosystem (societal laws, commercial availability, cultural norms). By constructing psychometric subscales mapped to each of these ecological tiers, the CTC-YS enables researchers to assess adolescent risk and protection comprehensively across the developmental ecology.

7. Validity

Extensive psychometric investigations have established the construct, criterion-related, predictive, convergent, and discriminant validity of the Communities That Care Youth Survey across diverse geographical and socioeconomic demographics:

Construct and Criterion Validity

Arthur, Hawkins, Pollard, Catalano, and Baglioni (2002) evaluated the survey’s construct validity across a six-state standardization sample of more than 72,000 public school students enrolled in grades 6, 8, 10, and 12. Criterion-related validity was confirmed through structural equation modeling and multivariate logistic regressions. Significant, dose-response correlations emerged between elevated scores on CTC-YS risk factor subscales and self-reported 30-day substance consumption, weapon carriage, violent altercations, and juvenile justice contact. Conversely, protective factor scales displayed pronounced negative relationships with delinquency, verifying their hypothesized buffering role.

Predictive and Longitudinal Validity

The predictive validity of the CTC-YS was reinforced by findings from the multi-site Community Youth Development Study (CYDS), a randomized controlled trial involving 24 matched communities across seven states (Hawkins et al., 2008, 2009). Baseline CTC-YS scores effectively predicted longitudinal behavioral trajectories: students who reported elevated peer delinquency, perceived availability of drugs, and poor family management in the 6th grade demonstrated statistically significant increases in substance initiation, persistent polydrug use, and school suspension rates when evaluated in the 8th, 10th, and 12th grades (Brown et al., 2009).

Convergent and Discriminant Validity

Convergent validity has been evaluated against gold-standard epidemiological instruments, including the Monitoring the Future (MTF) survey and the Youth Risk Behavior Surveillance System (YRBSS; CDC). Cross-comparisons demonstrate robust concordance between CTC-YS lifetime and 30-day prevalence estimates and corresponding MTF substance use indicators, with Pearson correlation coefficients frequently exceeding $r = .75$ for alcohol, tobacco, and cannabis measures. Discriminant validity has been demonstrated through the empirical separation of constructs across the four domains: exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses show that items measuring distinct risk facets (e.g., family conflict vs. academic failure) load cleanly onto their designated dimensions with negligible cross-loadings, demonstrating that the tool captures independent ecological influences rather than general, undifferentiated adolescent distress.

8. Reliability

The CTC-YS demonstrates strong internal consistency across its various risk and protective factor subscales, as well as consistent stability over time and across diverse demographic strata:

Internal Consistency

In the foundational psychometric validation paper by Arthur et al. (2002), Cronbach’s alpha coefficients were calculated across all 31 multi-item scales across distinct grade cohorts (6th, 8th, 10th, and 12th grades):

• Community Domain: Reliabilities range from α = .73 (Community Disorganization) to α = .84 (Perceived Availability of Handguns).
• Family Domain: Family Conflict demonstrated strong internal consistency (α = .80 to .84), Poor Family Management ranged between α = .78 and .82, and Parental Attitudes Favorable Toward Drug Use yielded α = .79 to .85 across grade levels.
• School Domain: Opportunities for Prosocial School Involvement yielded α = .68 to .73, while Rewards for Prosocial School Involvement reached α = .74 to .79. Academic Failure scales demonstrated internal consistency ranging from α = .67 to .72.
• Peer-Individual Domain: Peer Delinquent Behavior demonstrated strong internal consistency, yielding α coefficients between .84 and .89. Sensation Seeking reached α = .75, while Favorable Attitudes Toward Delinquency averaged α = .82.

The mean internal consistency coefficient across all multi-item scales typically exceeds α = .78. Although a small number of briefer 2- or 3-item subscales yield lower coefficients near the .65 boundary, they remain within acceptable psychometric thresholds for broad population-level screening surveys.

Measurement Invariance and Reliability across Subpopulations

Subsequent psychometric evaluations (e.g., Beyers et al., 2004; Glaser et al., 2005) examined the cross-demographic reliability of the CTC-YS. Multigroup analyses confirmed that internal consistency estimates remained stable across sex (males vs. females) and across major racial and ethnic categories (White, African American, Hispanic/Latino, Native American, and Asian/Pacific Islander youth). Scale reliabilities rarely varied by more than ±.03 between demographic subgroups, confirming that the questionnaire provides equitable measurement precision across culturally diverse adolescent populations.

9. Factor Analysis

The structural validity of the Communities That Care Youth Survey has been rigorously vetted through both exploratory factor analysis (EFA) and second-order confirmatory factor analysis (CFA):

Confirmatory Factor Modeling

Arthur et al. (2002) conducted extensive CFA runs to verify that the theoretical 31-factor measurement model fit the observed covariance matrix. Model estimations typically employ Weighted Least Squares Mean and Variance adjusted (WLSMV) or Maximum Likelihood Robust (MLR) methods, which account for the ordinal and categorical distribution of survey items. The empirical data demonstrated acceptable to good fit across diverse samples:

• Comparative Fit Index (CFI): Ranged consistently from .92 to .96 across separate grade bands, indicating strong structural fit relative to a baseline null model.
• Tucker-Lewis Index (TLI): Consistently exceeded the .90 threshold across community and family measurement configurations.
• Root Mean Square Error of Approximation (RMSEA): Values ranged between .038 and .049 (with 90% confidence intervals staying below .055), confirming low residual error.
• Standardized Root Mean Square Residual (SRMR): Maintained between .042 and .051 across the individual and peer subdomains.

Factor Loadings

Standardized factor loadings for individual items across their target constructs are generally strong. For example, within the Peer Delinquency scale, standardized loadings for peer cigarette, alcohol, and marijuana use items range between λ = .68 and λ = .84. Within the Poor Family Management construct, core items assessing whether parents know where the youth is or enforce home rules exhibit loadings from λ = .62 to λ = .79. Items measuring Favorable Attitudes Toward Substance Use load onto their primary dimension between λ = .71 and λ = .88, displaying low cross-loadings with generalized antisocial attitudes (λ < .20). Factor analytic investigations confirm that the proposed multidimensional taxonomy reflects the empirical structure of adolescent risk and protective factors.

10. Instrument / Measurement Tool

The Communities That Care Youth Survey (CTC-YS) is a comprehensive, structured self-report epidemiological survey designed for group administration in educational or community settings. The scale’s operational details include:

• Administration Format: Self-administered paper-and-pencil questionnaire booklet or secure, browser-based online testing portal. Typically completed within a standard 45- to 50-minute classroom instructional period.
• Target Population: Adolescents enrolled in grades 6 through 12 (approximately 11 to 18 years of age).
• Total Item Count: 197 distinct items arranged into thematic ecological modules.
• Response Formats: Employs diverse, developmentally tailored response structures:
  • Categorical and Demographic Selectors: Multiple-choice categorical options (e.g., gender identity, race/ethnicity, primary home language).
  • 4-Point Strongly Anchored Agreement Scales: Capitalized categorical formats designed to minimize ambiguity for younger respondents (■ NO! ■ no ■ yes ■ YES!), where “NO!” signifies strong disagreement and “YES!” denotes strong agreement.
  • Frequency and Occasion Scales: Ordinal categorical counts for lifetime and 30-day substance misuse and antisocial actions (0 occasions, 1 or 2 occasions, 3 to 5 occasions, 6 to 9 occasions, 10 to 19 occasions, 20 to 39 occasions, 40 or more occasions; and 0 Never to 40+ times).
  • Age of Onset Escalations: Longitudinal tracking options (Never have, 10 or younger, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17 or older).
  • Evaluative Likert Scales: Multiple 4-point to 5-point ordinal scales assessing perceived wrongness (Not wrong at all to Very wrong), perceived risk of harm (No risk to Great risk), availability (Very easy to Very hard), and subjective peer appraisals (No or very little chance to Very good chance).
• Data Integrity & Faking Detection: Includes built-in validity filters to screen out unengaged or untruthful respondents. This includes a fictitious drug item (“derbisol”; Items 52 and 53), logical consistency cross-checks (e.g., reporting 30-day drug use without lifetime drug use), and criteria for flagging identical, unvarying response patterns across long questionnaire sequences.
• Scoring Architecture: Raw responses are numerically coded (typically 1 to 4, 1 to 7, or 1 to 8 depending on the scale length). Negatively phrased or protective items are reverse-coded so that higher scores represent either higher levels of risk or higher levels of protection, depending on the specific scale. Subscale scores are calculated as the unweighted mean of non-missing items within each construct. Standardized T-scores or cut-point percentage profiles are then referenced against state or national normative databases to identify community prevention priorities.

11. Permissions, Fee, and Test Year

• Initial Publication Year: 2002 (Arthur, Hawkins, Pollard, Catalano, & Baglioni Jr.). Precursor survey variants and developmental pilot testing began in 1993 through early SDRG community research.
• Copyright & Ownership: The Communities That Care Youth Survey instrument was developed through public research funding from the National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA), the Center for Substance Abuse Prevention (CSAP), and the University of Washington’s Social Development Research Group (SDRG).
• Licensing and Accessibility: The CTC-YS is placed in the public domain for public health, municipal, and educational evaluation purposes. It is distributed free of charge. School districts, state agencies, and prevention coalitions may download, administer, and interpret the survey without commercial licensing fees.
• Operational Use: PDF copies, administrative manuals, and machine-readable survey templates can be accessed via the Social Development Research Group website or the SAMHSA Store. While the core questions are free to use, external commercial survey vendors may charge administrative fees for automated scanning, web hosting, and customized community profile reporting.

12. References

• Arthur, M. W., Hawkins, J. D., Pollard, J. A., Catalano, R. F., & Baglioni, A. J. (2002). Measuring risk and protective factors for substance use, delinquency, and other adolescent problem behaviors: The Communities That Care Youth Survey. Evaluation Review, 26(6), 575–601. https://doi.org/10.1177/0193841X0202600601
• Bandura, A. (1977). Social learning theory. Prentice-Hall.
• Beyers, J. M., Toumbourou, J. W., Catalano, R. F., & Hawkins, J. D. (2004). A cross-national comparison of risk and protective factors for adolescent substance use: The United States and Australia. Journal of Adolescent Health, 35(1), 3–16. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jadohealth.2003.08.015
• Brown, E. C., Hawkins, J. D., Arthur, M. W., Briney, J. S., & Abbott, R. D. (2007). Effects and administrative modes of the Communities That Care Youth Survey. Evaluation and Program Planning, 30(2), 186–195. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.evalprogplan.2007.01.003
• Brown, E. C., Hawkins, J. D., Arthur, M. W., Abbott, R. D., & Van Horn, M. L. (2009). Multilevel analysis of the effects of the Communities That Care prevention system on adolescent substance use and delinquency. American Journal of Community Psychology, 43(1–2), 41–58. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10464-008-9216-9
• Catalano, R. F., & Hawkins, J. D. (1996). The social development model: A theory of antisocial behavior. In J. D. Hawkins (Ed.), Delinquency and crime: Current theories (pp. 149–197). Cambridge University Press. https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511527623.007
• Glaser, R. R., Van Horn, M. L., Arthur, M. W., & Hawkins, J. D. (2005). Measurement properties of the Communities That Care Youth Survey across demographic groups. Journal of Quantitative Criminology, 21(1), 73–102. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10940-004-1788-1
• Hawkins, J. D., Catalano, R. F., & Miller, J. Y. (1992). Risk and protective factors for alcohol and other drug problems in adolescence and early adulthood: Implications for substance abuse prevention. Psychological Bulletin, 112(1), 64–105. https://doi.org/10.1037/0033-2909.112.1.64
• Hawkins, J. D., Catalano, R. F., Arthur, M. W., Egan, E., Brown, E. C., Abbott, R. D., & Murray, D. M. (2008). Testing Communities That Care: The trial of a community-based strategy to prevent youth problem behaviors. Archives of Pediatrics & Adolescent Medicine, 162(12), 1105–1112. https://doi.org/10.1001/archpedi.162.12.1105
• Hawkins, J. D., Oesterle, S., Brown, E. C., Arthur, M. W., Abbott, R. D., Fagan, A. A., & Catalano, R. F. (2009). Results of a 24-community cluster-randomized trial of Communities That Care. Archives of Pediatrics & Adolescent Medicine, 163(9), 789–798. https://doi.org/10.1001/archpedi.2009.135
• Hirschi, T. (1969). Causes of delinquency. University of California Press.
• Sutherland, E. H. (1947). Principles of criminology (4th ed.). J. B. Lippincott.

13. Items of the Scale