Commentary on the symposium on the theory and practice of engaging youth in prevention message creation.

The symposium articles address a variety of assumptions concerning interventions in which youth create prevention messaging. These articles help confirm that young people left to themselves are likely to engage in self-persuasion through such message creation but are less likely to create messages persuasive to others. However, with youth working collaboratively with persons more expert in message production, effective messaging can be created. Symposium articles also provide important and useful theoretical frameworks for the effective design of such interventions and for understanding the persuasive effects of personal narratives.