Dr. Steve Sussman is a professor of preventive medicine and psychology at the University of Southern California. Dr. Sussman conducts research in the prediction, prevention, and cessation of tobacco and other drug abuse and in the utility of empirical program development methods. He is first author on the book Developing School-Based Tobacco Use Prevention and Cessation Programs (1995), based on his previous research in that arena. He is also the editor of Handbook of Program Development for Health Behavior Research and Practice (2001), a leading text in this arena, and he is the lead author on the upcoming text The Social Psychology of Drug Abuse (with Susan L. Ames; September, 2001). He was the principal investigator of Project Towards No Tobacco Use (Project TNT). Project TNT is a tobacco use prevention and cessation project among young teens, which is being disseminated nationally by the Centers for Disease Control as a "Program That Works" and by the Centers for Substance Abuse Prevention as a model program. It is also recognized as a model program by the Department of Education of the State of California, Sociometrics Inc, and by the National Institute on Drug Abuse. Recently this project also became recognized as an exemplary program by the U.S. Department of Education. His other projects include Project EX, a successful adolescent tobacco-use cessation program which was tested through use of a large, true field experimental design, and Project Towards No Drug Abuse (Project TND), which is a drug abuse prevention project for older teens, particularly for those at risk for drug abuse. Project TND is now considered a model program by the Centers for Substance Abuse Prevention, Health Canada, Sociometrics Inc, and the National Institute on Drug Abuse. He has published over 160 articles, chapters, or books in the arena of drug use and abuse.
A recent report from the United States Surgeon General shows that some school-based tobacco use prevention programmes have proved successful in discouraging first use of tobacco among children. Dissemination of these programmes, however, has been minimal. Taking a health researcher's perspective, the authors of this volume discuss the history, status and needs of school-based tobacco use prevention/cessation research. Issues addressed include how to implement such programmes and the major theoretical and methodological issues involved. Details of the Project Toward No Tobacco Use (TNT) are also covered.
