Fidelity of implementation of the building bridges mentoring intervention to prevent violence among youth in low income settings

Abstract

Violence among youth is a major health and safety burden globally. There is a dearth in the development and evaluation of targeted interventions that addresses the multi-faceted nature of youth violence to ensure effectiveness and replicability. This study aims to systematically evaluate the fidelity of implementation of the Building Bridges Mentoring intervention that focuses on the prevention of youth violence in two low-income communities in South Africa. This study employed a mixed methods concurrent triangulation design. Qualitative data were analysed using deductive thematic analysis, and quantitative data using descriptive statistics and T-tests. The results indicate that for all the intervention components, implementation fidelity (i.e. adherence, exposure, quality of programme delivery, and participant responsiveness) was generally moderate to high, suggesting a ‘good’ implementation of the programme in the real world. Evaluating the fidelity of implementation is vital to obtain a comprehensive insight into whether an intervention was implemented according to its design, and to verify and validate the findings and outcomes, and accord credibility and integrity of the study.