Grant: Project Grant

The cultural strengths of Canada's Indigenous communities are prominent in the midst of centuries of devastating colonization. Moreover, evidence shows that cultural connectedness inspires well-being among Indigenous youth. However, adolescence is a time fraught with uncertainty about one's identity and opportunities to drink and smoke. The objective of our project is to leverage the inherent strengths of Indigenous culture to develop a model of resilience. We aim to use a two-eyed seeing approach, in which both Indigenous and Western perspectives are used to identify factors that protect Indigenous youth from substance use. Further, we aim to translate knowledge learned back to Indigenous community youth using the traditional method of storytelling. To reach these aims, we propose a five-year study that will focus on adolescents in one Northern Quebec Indigenous community. This will be a three stage project. Stage 1 will be community listening. The research team and community members will come together to define culture and community context, and how these relate to youth substance use. Stage 2 will be an empirical study. In a school-based study, potential predictors of substance use will be assessed over a three-year period as adolescents progress through secondary school. This will permit the unique opportunity to track culturally- (community-) relevant protective factors of substance use as they unfold across formative years. Stage 3 will focus on knowledge translation and communicating what is learned back to the community. The findings will be shaped into stories of resilience that are told by community members. A compilation of storytelling will be filmed, and DVDs and an online version produced. These will be the property of the community and distributed through varied platforms, such as community events and youth programs. To summarize, this research aims to illustrate the process and product of using two-eyed seeing to address a compelling health issue.