Table 1a.

”Life Skills Training“ (LST) programs measuring both emotional and social skills, and healthy behavior outcomes.

Study	Country	Interventions (Focus; Sample Size)	Controls (Focus; Sample Size)	Students’ Population Size	Students’ Age/Grade at Baseline	Duration and Assessment Timeline
Buhler et al., [46]	Germany	“General Life Competencies and Skills” - Life Skills Training (program to to promote life skills and prevent substances use; N= 256)	Treatment as usual (Not defined; N=192)	N=448	5 grade	1 academic year (pre-post)
Eisen et al., [42] - see also: Eisen et al., [68]	USA	Lions–Quest Skills for Adolescents (SFA) (life skills training’ program to promote life skills and prevent drug use; N=not reported)	Standard care (Not defined; N=not reported)	N= 7426	6 grade	1 academic year (40 key sessions) (baseline at the and of year 6 and post-treatment at the end of year 7) (pre-post).
Fitzpatrick et al., [20]	Ireland	Working Things Out - Social, Personal and Health Education Programme (SPHP) - Enhanced (EP) (life skills training’ program plus mental health promotion component to promote life skills, shool ethos and prevent emotional and behavioural difficulties; N= 527	Social, Personal and Health Education Programme (SPHP) – Standard (SP) (life skills training’ program; N=545	N=1072	7-11 grades	8 months (pre-post + 6 months follow-up)
Huang et al., [48]	Taiwan	Life Skills Training (program based on Theaory of Planned Behavior (TPB) to promote life skills and prevent drugs use; N= 143)	- Conventional (conventional didactic teaching about the harmful effects of using illicit drugs and drugs refusal skills for two 45-minutes sessions; N=142) - No intervention (N=156)	N=441	7 grade	16 weeks + 8-10 weeks homeworks (pre-post)
Johnson et al., [43]	USA	Think Smart – Life Skills Training (program to promote life skills and prevent use of harmfull legal products (HLP); N= 630)	No intervention (N= 586)	N=1216	5 grade	12 weeks (core sessions) + 3 weeks after 2-3 months from core sessions (booster sessions) (wave 1 – baseline: prior to the start of core sessions; wave 2 – post-treatment: after the end of booster sessions; wave 3: 6 months follow-up)
Resnicow et al., [49]	South Africa	- Life Skills Training ( life skills training’ program to promote life skills and prevent drug use; N=1717) - KEEP LEFT (Harm minimization program to prevent substance use; N=1978)	Usual tobacco and substance use education (N=1571)	N = 5266	8 grade (baseline)	2 academic years (8 units for each of grade 8 and 9) (pre-1 post at the end of grade 8-1 post test al the end of grade 9)
Seal, [50]	Thailand	Life Skills Training (program to promote life skills and prevent tobacco and drug use; N=85)	Treatment as usual (Tobacco and drug education curriculum normally provided; N=85)	N=170	7-12 grades	10 class period (≈60 min each or 10 class hours of content) (pre-post after 6 months)
Walker et al., [51]	Mexico	- Life Skills Training (programe to promote life skills, condome use and HIV knowledge; N = not reported ) - Life Skills Training + module on emergency contraception (programe to promote life skills, condome use, HIV knowledge and emergency contraception; n = not reported)	Biology based sex education course (N = not reported)	N= 10.954	10-12 grades	1 academic year (15 week, 30 hour course (16 weeks, 32 hours for the promotion with contraception arm) (pre-post + 16 months follow-up)