Which type of prevention strategy focuses on community-level interventions to decrease substance use?

The focus on community-level interventions to decrease substance use aligns perfectly with environmental prevention strategies. This approach targets the broader community context in which substance use occurs, by modifying the environmental factors that contribute to substance use and related problems. Environmental prevention can involve policy changes, community programming, and initiatives that create norms and conditions that discourage substance use on a larger scale.

By implementing these strategies, communities can influence the availability, access, and acceptance of substances within their environment. This could include changing laws related to substance use, enhancing community outreach programs, and creating supportive environments that promote healthy alternatives. Consequently, the effectiveness of this prevention strategy is rooted in its emphasis on collective action and structural changes within communities, rather than focusing solely on individual behaviors or specific risk groups.

Other choices revolve more around targeted or individual approaches rather than broad community interventions, and therefore are not as fitting in this context. Universal prevention, for example, aims at the general population without specific targeting; selective prevention hones in on subgroups at greater risk; and indicated prevention focuses on individuals already exhibiting risky behaviors. All these strategies can be part of a comprehensive prevention approach, but they don’t specifically emphasize the community-level intervention aspect as environmental prevention does.