The Community-Level Health Promotion [CLHP] Study Section reviews applications that test the efficacy of interventions concerned with the prevention of a broad range of health risk behaviors across the life span. Basic studies may investigate social, cultural, and other socioenvironmental factors and processes and their inter-relationships with a broad range of outcomes, including mental and physical health, illness and disorder, risk and protective behaviors and behavior change, health beliefs and attitudes, and normal development and functioning across the lifespan. Intervention research may focus on the modification of health risk behaviors and health-related decision making through environmental change and/or the use of social, organizational, political and legal systems to reduce and prevent risk behaviors within the general or select populations. It includes community-based interventions, studies to develop and test theories or methods, and dissemination studies. Research approaches may include ethnographic and other qualitative methods; quantitative and mixed-method studies; cross-sectional, longitudinal, or cohort comparison designs; experimental and quasi-experimental designs; studies that focus on more than one period or transition of the life course; and international studies. 

Specific areas covered by CLHP: 

·         Social environment change, including prevention approaches based on policy development, change, and enforcement; legal analyses of policies and their implementation; information dissemination; health promotion; organization or reorganization in communities, schools, worksites or other relevant environment settings; and sports medicine and exercise. Studies may be directed toward the general population or at-risk groups and may utilize multiple social contexts of influence [e.g., schools, worksites, religious and non-sectarian organizations, community networks, media and advertising].

·         Community and organizational interventions for the prevention and modification of risk behaviors, including randomized experimental and quasi-experimental designs where the community or other multi-person entity is the unit of assignment; interventions that utilize community resources, organizations and information systems for outreach, health education or preventive service delivery; natural experiments; studies of social and organizational networks as systems for intervention delivery; and studies of organization and community characteristics and change processes underlying successful intervention implementation [e.g., community readiness or organization].

·          Studies of the adoption and dissemination of health-risk behavior preventive interventions, including studies of intervention effectiveness, variations in implementation, and/or acceptance by the target population; and studies of intervention characteristics affecting adoption, acceptance and fidelity of implementation by organizations and communities. 

CLHP has the following shared interests within the HOP IRG: 

·          With the Behavioral Genetics and Epidemiology [BGES]: BGES also reviews applications that focus upon high-risk behavior. Applications that focus primarily upon genetic factors or that emphasize the use of epidemiological methods may be reviewed in BGES.

·          With Biostatistical Methods and Research Design [BMRD]:  BMRD also reviews applications that attempt to establish the relationship between socioenvironmental factors and health and health-related outcomes. Applications in which the primary emphasis is upon the development of new statistical methodology or the improvement of existing research designs may be reviewed by BMRD.

·         With Community Influences on Health Behavior [CIHB]:  CIHB reviews applications that examine the broader socioenvironmental contexts in which health, disease, health-related behavior, and normal development are embedded and the interaction of socioenvironmental factors with individual factors with respect to those outcomes.  CLHP previously reviewed these applications until the establishment of CIHB.

·          With Health Services Organization and Delivery [HSOD]: HSOD also reviews applications that explore complex inter-relationships among economic, social, cultural, and environmental influences and health and health-related outcomes. Applications that focus on the delivery or organization of professional health services may be reviewed by HSOD.

·          With Nursing Science: Adults and Aging [NSAA] and Nursing Science: Children and Families [NSCF]: NSAA and NSCF also review applications that attempt to establish the relationship between socioenvironmental factors and health and health-related outcomes.  Applications in which the primary emphasis is upon nursing care and research relating to nursing interventions in patient care may be reviewed by NSAA or NSCF, depending upon the age groups being studied. 

·          With Social Sciences and Population Studies [SSPS]:  SSPS also reviews applications that focus upon high-risk behavior, that are multi-level, or that emphasize the relationships between socioenvironmental factors and health related behavior.  Applications that emphasize determination of health status at the community level or that emphasize behavior related to family structure, human reproduction, or population mobility may be reviewed in SSPS. Those that emphasize community-based interventions may be reviewed in CLHP unless they involve STDs or contraceptive behavior as outcome variables. These may be reviewed in SSPS.