The German SiE pilot intervention, “Kinder- und Jugendschutz: Auch zu Hause!” (Youth protection law: Also at home!, was implemented in Kiel (Schleswig-Holstein) and aimed to train parents to be stricter law enforcers in the private environment, to reduce alcohol availability at home and to stop serving alcohol to minors. In Germany, legal drinking age is 16 years for beer and wine and 18 years for spirits. However, the majority of German adolescents have their first experiences with alcohol before the age of 16 and first alcohol use usually takes place at home. A recent representative survey among German parents with children aged 12 to 17 years revealed that the majority of households do not have alcohol-specific rules at home and about half of the parents belief it is appropriate to serve alcohol to children below the age of 15 under parental supervision. Further, two thirds of the parents judged it to be “very easy” or “easy” for their children to get alcohol at home. However, from a scientific point of view, serving alcohol to minors should not be seen as “responsible serving”.
The main path of mobilisation for the German SiE pilot was through the educational system of the Kiel pilot region (STAD-pillar: “community mobilization”). This allowed to reach as many parents of the community as possible. Parents of pilot schools were contacted through brochures and leaflets, published by the municipality of Kiel. In addition, the local newspaper was actively involved in rising awareness and to mobilize the community. Two trainers delivered the parent workshops, one project team member together with a paediatrician (STAD-pillar: “Training”).
Figure 1 summarizes the background information for the parent workshops. The basic message was that being strict on alcohol actually “frees” children from having to drink alcohol too early and protects them from detrimental effects on their emotional and cognitive development. In the second part of the training, parents were provided with specific rules for alcohol use at home (STAD pillar: “Enforcement”). The trained home rules can be found in Figure 2.
Figure 1. Schematic overview of intervention contents.
Figure 2. New rules at home: Parent training.