drug and alcohol abuse in youth essay

An official website of the United States government

The .gov means it’s official. Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

The site is secure. The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

• Publications
• Account settings

Preview improvements coming to the PMC website in October 2024. Learn More or Try it out now .

• Advanced Search
• Journal List
• BMC Public Health

Risk and protective factors of drug abuse among adolescents: a systematic review

Azmawati mohammed nawi.

1 Department of Community Health, Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia, Cheras, 56000 Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia

Rozmi Ismail

2 Centre for Research in Psychology and Human Well-Being (PSiTra), Faculty of Social Sciences and Humanities, Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia, 43600 Bangi, Selangor Malaysia

Fauziah Ibrahim

Mohd rohaizat hassan, mohd rizal abdul manaf.

3 Clinical Psychology and Behavioural Health Program, Faculty of Health Sciences, Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia

Norhayati Ibrahim

Nurul shafini shafurdin, associated data.

All data generated or analysed during this study are included in this published article.

Drug abuse is detrimental, and excessive drug usage is a worldwide problem. Drug usage typically begins during adolescence. Factors for drug abuse include a variety of protective and risk factors. Hence, this systematic review aimed to determine the risk and protective factors of drug abuse among adolescents worldwide.

Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses (PRISMA) was adopted for the review which utilized three main journal databases, namely PubMed, EBSCOhost, and Web of Science. Tobacco addiction and alcohol abuse were excluded in this review. Retrieved citations were screened, and the data were extracted based on strict inclusion and exclusion criteria. Inclusion criteria include the article being full text, published from the year 2016 until 2020 and provided via open access resource or subscribed to by the institution. Quality assessment was done using Mixed Methods Appraisal Tools (MMAT) version 2018 to assess the methodological quality of the included studies. Given the heterogeneity of the included studies, a descriptive synthesis of the included studies was undertaken.

Out of 425 articles identified, 22 quantitative articles and one qualitative article were included in the final review. Both the risk and protective factors obtained were categorized into three main domains: individual, family, and community factors. The individual risk factors identified were traits of high impulsivity; rebelliousness; emotional regulation impairment, low religious, pain catastrophic, homework completeness, total screen time and alexithymia; the experience of maltreatment or a negative upbringing; having psychiatric disorders such as conduct problems and major depressive disorder; previous e-cigarette exposure; behavioral addiction; low-perceived risk; high-perceived drug accessibility; and high-attitude to use synthetic drugs. The familial risk factors were prenatal maternal smoking; poor maternal psychological control; low parental education; negligence; poor supervision; uncontrolled pocket money; and the presence of substance-using family members. One community risk factor reported was having peers who abuse drugs. The protective factors determined were individual traits of optimism; a high level of mindfulness; having social phobia; having strong beliefs against substance abuse; the desire to maintain one’s health; high paternal awareness of drug abuse; school connectedness; structured activity and having strong religious beliefs.

The outcomes of this review suggest a complex interaction between a multitude of factors influencing adolescent drug abuse. Therefore, successful adolescent drug abuse prevention programs will require extensive work at all levels of domains.

Introduction

Drug abuse is a global problem; 5.6% of the global population aged 15–64 years used drugs at least once during 2016 [ 1 ]. The usage of drugs among younger people has been shown to be higher than that among older people for most drugs. Drug abuse is also on the rise in many ASEAN (Association of Southeast Asian Nations) countries, especially among young males between 15 and 30 years of age. The increased burden due to drug abuse among adolescents and young adults was shown by the Global Burden of Disease (GBD) study in 2013 [ 2 ]. About 14% of the total health burden in young men is caused by alcohol and drug abuse. Younger people are also more likely to die from substance use disorders [ 3 ], and cannabis is the drug of choice among such users [ 4 ].

Adolescents are the group of people most prone to addiction [ 5 ]. The critical age of initiation of drug use begins during the adolescent period, and the maximum usage of drugs occurs among young people aged 18–25 years old [ 1 ]. During this period, adolescents have a strong inclination toward experimentation, curiosity, susceptibility to peer pressure, rebellion against authority, and poor self-worth, which makes such individuals vulnerable to drug abuse [ 2 ]. During adolescence, the basic development process generally involves changing relations between the individual and the multiple levels of the context within which the young person is accustomed. Variation in the substance and timing of these relations promotes diversity in adolescence and represents sources of risk or protective factors across this life period [ 6 ]. All these factors are crucial to helping young people develop their full potential and attain the best health in the transition to adulthood. Abusing drugs impairs the successful transition to adulthood by impairing the development of critical thinking and the learning of crucial cognitive skills [ 7 ]. Adolescents who abuse drugs are also reported to have higher rates of physical and mental illness and reduced overall health and well-being [ 8 ].

The absence of protective factors and the presence of risk factors predispose adolescents to drug abuse. Some of the risk factors are the presence of early mental and behavioral health problems, peer pressure, poorly equipped schools, poverty, poor parental supervision and relationships, a poor family structure, a lack of opportunities, isolation, gender, and accessibility to drugs [ 9 ]. The protective factors include high self-esteem, religiosity, grit, peer factors, self-control, parental monitoring, academic competence, anti-drug use policies, and strong neighborhood attachment [ 10 – 15 ].

The majority of previous systematic reviews done worldwide on drug usage focused on the mental, psychological, or social consequences of substance abuse [ 16 – 18 ], while some focused only on risk and protective factors for the non-medical use of prescription drugs among youths [ 19 ]. A few studies focused only on the risk factors of single drug usage among adolescents [ 20 ]. Therefore, the development of the current systematic review is based on the main research question: What is the current risk and protective factors among adolescent on the involvement with drug abuse? To the best of our knowledge, there is limited evidence from systematic reviews that explores the risk and protective factors among the adolescent population involved in drug abuse. Especially among developing countries, such as those in South East Asia, such research on the risk and protective factors for drug abuse is scarce. Furthermore, this review will shed light on the recent trends of risk and protective factors and provide insight into the main focus factors for prevention and control activities program. Additionally, this review will provide information on how these risk and protective factors change throughout various developmental stages. Therefore, the objective of this systematic review was to determine the risk and protective factors of drug abuse among adolescents worldwide. This paper thus fills in the gaps of previous studies and adds to the existing body of knowledge. In addition, this review may benefit certain parties in developing countries like Malaysia, where the national response to drugs is developing in terms of harm reduction, prison sentences, drug treatments, law enforcement responses, and civil society participation.

This systematic review was conducted using three databases, PubMed, EBSCOhost, and Web of Science, considering the easy access and wide coverage of reliable journals, focusing on the risk and protective factors of drug abuse among adolescents from 2016 until December 2020. The search was limited to the last 5 years to focus only on the most recent findings related to risk and protective factors. The search strategy employed was performed in accordance with the Preferred Reporting Items for a Systematic Review and Meta-analysis (PRISMA) checklist.

A preliminary search was conducted to identify appropriate keywords and determine whether this review was feasible. Subsequently, the related keywords were searched using online thesauruses, online dictionaries, and online encyclopedias. These keywords were verified and validated by an academic professor at the National University of Malaysia. The keywords used as shown in Table  1 .

The search strings

Selection criteria

The systematic review process for searching the articles was carried out via the steps shown in Fig.  1 . Firstly, screening was done to remove duplicate articles from the selected search engines. A total of 240 articles were removed in this stage. Titles and abstracts were screened based on the relevancy of the titles to the inclusion and exclusion criteria and the objectives. The inclusion criteria were full text original articles, open access articles or articles subscribed to by the institution, observation and intervention study design and English language articles. The exclusion criteria in this search were (a) case study articles, (b) systematic and narrative review paper articles, (c) non-adolescent-based analyses, (d) non-English articles, and (e) articles focusing on smoking (nicotine) and alcohol-related issues only. A total of 130 articles were excluded after title and abstract screening, leaving 55 articles to be assessed for eligibility. The full text of each article was obtained, and each full article was checked thoroughly to determine if it would fulfil the inclusion criteria and objectives of this study. Each of the authors compared their list of potentially relevant articles and discussed their selections until a final agreement was obtained. A total of 22 articles were accepted to be included in this review. Most of the excluded articles were excluded because the population was not of the target age range—i.e., featuring subjects with an age > 18 years, a cohort born in 1965–1975, or undergraduate college students; the subject matter was not related to the study objective—i.e., assessing the effects on premature mortality, violent behavior, psychiatric illness, individual traits, and personality; type of article such as narrative review and neuropsychiatry review; and because of our inability to obtain the full article—e.g., forthcoming work in 2021. One qualitative article was added to explain the domain related to risk and the protective factors among the adolescents.

PRISMA flow diagram showing the selection of studies on risk and protective factors for drug abuse among adolescents.2.2. Operational Definition

Drug-related substances in this context refer to narcotics, opioids, psychoactive substances, amphetamines, cannabis, ecstasy, heroin, cocaine, hallucinogens, depressants, and stimulants. Drugs of abuse can be either off-label drugs or drugs that are medically prescribed. The two most commonly abused substances not included in this review are nicotine (tobacco) and alcohol. Accordingly, e-cigarettes and nicotine vape were also not included. Further, “adolescence” in this study refers to members of the population aged between 10 to 18 years [ 21 ].

Data extraction tool

All researchers independently extracted information for each article into an Excel spreadsheet. The data were then customized based on their (a) number; (b) year; (c) author and country; (d) titles; (e) study design; (f) type of substance abuse; (g) results—risks and protective factors; and (h) conclusions. A second reviewer crossed-checked the articles assigned to them and provided comments in the table.

Quality assessment tool

By using the Mixed Method Assessment Tool (MMAT version 2018), all articles were critically appraised for their quality by two independent reviewers. This tool has been shown to be useful in systematic reviews encompassing different study designs [ 22 ]. Articles were only selected if both reviewers agreed upon the articles’ quality. Any disagreement between the assigned reviewers was managed by employing a third independent reviewer. All included studies received a rating of “yes” for the questions in the respective domains of the MMAT checklists. Therefore, none of the articles were removed from this review due to poor quality. The Cohen’s kappa (agreement) between the two reviewers was 0.77, indicating moderate agreement [ 23 ].

The initial search found 425 studies for review, but after removing duplicates and applying the criteria listed above, we narrowed the pool to 22 articles, all of which are quantitative in their study design. The studies include three prospective cohort studies [ 24 – 26 ], one community trial [ 27 ], one case-control study [ 28 ], and nine cross-sectional studies [ 29 – 45 ]. After careful discussion, all reviewer panels agreed to add one qualitative study [ 46 ] to help provide reasoning for the quantitative results. The selected qualitative paper was chosen because it discussed almost all domains on the risk and protective factors found in this review.

A summary of all 23 articles is listed in Table  2 . A majority of the studies (13 articles) were from the United States of America (USA) [ 25 – 27 , 29 – 31 , 34 , 36 – 45 ], three studies were from the Asia region [ 32 , 33 , 38 ], four studies were from Europe [ 24 , 28 , 40 , 44 ], and one study was from Latin America [ 35 ], Africa [ 43 ] and Mediterranean [ 45 ]. The number of sample participants varied widely between the studies, ranging from 70 samples (minimum) to 700,178 samples (maximum), while the qualitative paper utilized a total of 100 interviewees. There were a wide range of drugs assessed in the quantitative articles, with marijuana being mentioned in 11 studies, cannabis in five studies, and opioid (six studies). There was also large heterogeneity in terms of the study design, type of drug abused, measurements of outcomes, and analysis techniques used. Therefore, the data were presented descriptively.

Study characteristic and main findings

After thorough discussion and evaluation, all the findings (both risk and protective factors) from the review were categorized into three main domains: individual factors, family factors, and community factors. The conceptual framework is summarized in Fig.  2 .

Conceptual framework of risk and protective factors related to adolescent drug abuse

DOMAIN: individual factor

Risk factors.

Almost all the articles highlighted significant findings of individual risk factors for adolescent drug abuse. Therefore, our findings for this domain were further broken down into five more sub-domains consisting of personal/individual traits, significant negative growth exposure, personal psychiatric diagnosis, previous substance history, comorbidity and an individual’s attitude and perception.

Personal/individual traits

Chuang et al. [ 29 ] found that adolescents with high impulsivity traits had a significant positive association with drug addiction. This study also showed that the impulsivity trait alone was an independent risk factor that increased the odds between two to four times for using any drug compared to the non-impulsive group. Another longitudinal study by Guttmannova et al. showed that rebellious traits are positively associated with marijuana drug abuse [ 27 ]. The authors argued that measures of rebelliousness are a good proxy for a youth’s propensity to engage in risky behavior. Nevertheless, Wilson et al. [ 37 ], in a study involving 112 youths undergoing detoxification treatment for opioid abuse, found that a majority of the affected respondents had difficulty in regulating their emotions. The authors found that those with emotional regulation impairment traits became opioid dependent at an earlier age. Apart from that, a case-control study among outpatient youths found that adolescents involved in cannabis abuse had significant alexithymia traits compared to the control population [ 28 ]. Those adolescents scored high in the dimension of Difficulty in Identifying Emotion (DIF), which is one of the key definitions of diagnosing alexithymia. Overall, the adjusted Odds Ratio for DIF in cannabis abuse was 1.11 (95% CI, 1.03–1.20).

Significant negative growth exposure

A history of maltreatment in the past was also shown to have a positive association with adolescent drug abuse. A study found that a history of physical abuse in the past is associated with adolescent drug abuse through a Path Analysis, despite evidence being limited to the female gender [ 25 ]. However, evidence from another study focusing at foster care concluded that any type of maltreatment might result in a prevalence as high as 85.7% for the lifetime use of cannabis and as high as 31.7% for the prevalence of cannabis use within the last 3-months [ 30 ]. The study also found significant latent variables that accounted for drug abuse outcomes, which were chronic physical maltreatment (factor loading of 0.858) and chronic psychological maltreatment (factor loading of 0.825), with an r 2 of 73.6 and 68.1%, respectively. Another study shed light on those living in child welfare service (CWS) [ 35 ]. It was observed through longitudinal measurements that proportions of marijuana usage increased from 9 to 18% after 36 months in CWS. Hence, there is evidence of the possibility of a negative upbringing at such shelters.

Personal psychiatric diagnosis

The robust studies conducted in the USA have deduced that adolescents diagnosed with a conduct problem (CP) have a positive association with marijuana abuse (OR = 1.75 [1.56, 1.96], p  < 0.0001). Furthermore, those with a diagnosis of Major Depressive Disorder (MDD) showed a significant positive association with marijuana abuse.

Previous substance and addiction history

Another study found that exposure to e-cigarettes within the past 30 days is related to an increase in the prevalence of marijuana use and prescription drug use by at least four times in the 8th and 10th grades and by at least three times in the 12th grade [ 34 ]. An association between other behavioral addictions and the development of drug abuse was also studied [ 29 ]. Using a 12-item index to assess potential addictive behaviors [ 39 ], significant associations between drug abuse and the groups with two behavioral addictions (OR = 3.19, 95% CI 1.25,9.77) and three behavioral addictions (OR = 3.46, 95% CI 1.25,9.58) were reported.

Comorbidity

The paper by Dash et al. (2020) highlight adolescent with a disease who needs routine medical pain treatment have higher risk of opioid misuse [ 38 ]. The adolescents who have disorder symptoms may have a risk for opioid misuse despite for the pain intensity.

Individual’s attitudes and perceptions

In a study conducted in three Latin America countries (Argentina, Chile, and Uruguay), it was shown that adolescents with low or no perceived risk of taking marijuana had a higher risk of abuse (OR = 8.22 times, 95% CI 7.56, 10.30) [ 35 ]. This finding is in line with another study that investigated 2002 adolescents and concluded that perceiving the drug as harmless was an independent risk factor that could prospectively predict future marijuana abuse [ 27 ]. Moreover, some youth interviewed perceived that they gained benefits from substance use [ 38 ]. The focus group discussion summarized that the youth felt positive personal motivation and could escape from a negative state by taking drugs. Apart from that, adolescents who had high-perceived availability of drugs in their neighborhoods were more likely to increase their usage of marijuana over time (OR = 11.00, 95% CI 9.11, 13.27) [ 35 ]. A cheap price of the substance and the availability of drug dealers around schools were factors for youth accessibility [ 38 ]. Perceived drug accessibility has also been linked with the authorities’ enforcement programs. The youth perception of a lax community enforcement of laws regarding drug use at all-time points predicted an increase in marijuana use in the subsequent assessment period [ 27 ]. Besides perception, a study examining the attitudes towards synthetic drugs based on 8076 probabilistic samples of Macau students found that the odds of the lifetime use of marijuana was almost three times higher among those with a strong attitude towards the use of synthetic drugs [ 32 ]. In addition, total screen time among the adolescent increase the likelihood of frequent cannabis use. Those who reported daily cannabis use have a mean of 12.56 h of total screen time, compared to a mean of 6.93 h among those who reported no cannabis use. Adolescent with more time on internet use, messaging, playing video games and watching TV/movies were significantly associated with more frequent cannabis use [ 44 ].

Protective factors

Individual traits.

Some individual traits have been determined to protect adolescents from developing drug abuse habits. A study by Marin et al. found that youth with an optimistic trait were less likely to become drug dependent [ 33 ]. In this study involving 1104 Iranian students, it was concluded that a higher optimism score (measured using the Children Attributional Style Questionnaire, CASQ) was a protective factor against illicit drug use (OR = 0.90, 95% CI: 0.85–0.95). Another study found that high levels of mindfulness, measured using the 25-item Child Acceptance and Mindfulness Measure, CAMM, lead to a slower progression toward injectable drug abuse among youth with opioid addiction (1.67 years, p  = .041) [ 37 ]. In addition, the social phobia trait was found to have a negative association with marijuana use (OR = 0.87, 95% CI 0.77–0.97), as suggested [ 31 ].

According to El Kazdouh et al., individuals with a strong belief against substance use and those with a strong desire to maintain their health were more likely to be protected from involvement in drug abuse [ 46 ].

DOMAIN: family factors

The biological factors underlying drug abuse in adolescents have been reported in several studies. Epigenetic studies are considered important, as they can provide a good outline of the potential pre-natal factors that can be targeted at an earlier stage. Expecting mothers who smoke tobacco and alcohol have an indirect link with adolescent substance abuse in later life [ 24 , 39 ]. Moreover, the dynamic relationship between parents and their children may have some profound effects on the child’s growth. Luk et al. examined the mediator effects between parenting style and substance abuse and found the maternal psychological control dimension to be a significant variable [ 26 ]. The mother’s psychological control was two times higher in influencing her children to be involved in substance abuse compared to the other dimension. Conversely, an indirect risk factor towards youth drug abuse was elaborated in a study in which low parental educational level predicted a greater risk of future drug abuse by reducing the youth’s perception of harm [ 27 , 43 ]. Negligence from a parental perspective could also contribute to this problem. According to El Kazdouh et al. [ 46 ], a lack of parental supervision, uncontrolled pocket money spending among children, and the presence of substance-using family members were the most common negligence factors.

While the maternal factors above were shown to be risk factors, the opposite effect was seen when the paternal figure equipped himself with sufficient knowledge. A study found that fathers with good information and awareness were more likely to protect their adolescent children from drug abuse [ 26 ]. El Kazdouh et al. noted that support and advice could be some of the protective factors in this area [ 46 ].

DOMAIN: community factors

Risk factor.

A study in 2017 showed a positive association between adolescent drug abuse and peers who abuse drugs [ 32 , 39 ]. It was estimated that the odds of becoming a lifetime marijuana user was significantly increased by a factor of 2.5 ( p  < 0.001) among peer groups who were taking synthetic drugs. This factor served as peer pressure for youth, who subconsciously had desire to be like the others [ 38 ]. The impact of availability and engagement in structured and unstructured activities also play a role in marijuana use. The findings from Spillane (2000) found that the availability of unstructured activities was associated with increased likelihood of marijuana use [ 42 ].

Protective factor

Strong religious beliefs integrated into society serve as a crucial protective factor that can prevent adolescents from engaging in drug abuse [ 38 , 45 ]. In addition, the school connectedness and adult support also play a major contribution in the drug use [ 40 ].

The goal of this review was to identify and classify the risks and protective factors that lead adolescents to drug abuse across the three important domains of the individual, family, and community. No findings conflicted with each other, as each of them had their own arguments and justifications. The findings from our review showed that individual factors were the most commonly highlighted. These factors include individual traits, significant negative growth exposure, personal psychiatric diagnosis, previous substance and addiction history, and an individual’s attitude and perception as risk factors.

Within the individual factor domain, nine articles were found to contribute to the subdomain of personal/ individual traits [ 27 – 29 , 37 – 40 , 43 , 44 ]. Despite the heterogeneity of the study designs and the substances under investigation, all of the papers found statistically significant results for the possible risk factors of adolescent drug abuse. The traits of high impulsivity, rebelliousness, difficulty in regulating emotions, and alexithymia can be considered negative characteristic traits. These adolescents suffer from the inability to self-regulate their emotions, so they tend to externalize their behaviors as a way to avoid or suppress the negative feelings that they are experiencing [ 41 , 47 , 48 ]. On the other hand, engaging in such behaviors could plausibly provide a greater sense of positive emotions and make them feel good [ 49 ]. Apart from that, evidence from a neurophysiological point of view also suggests that the compulsive drive toward drug use is complemented by deficits in impulse control and decision making (impulsive trait) [ 50 ]. A person’s ability in self-control will seriously impaired with continuous drug use and will lead to the hallmark of addiction [ 51 ].

On the other hand, there are articles that reported some individual traits to be protective for adolescents from engaging in drug abuse. Youth with the optimistic trait, a high level of mindfulness, and social phobia were less likely to become drug dependent [ 31 , 33 , 37 ]. All of these articles used different psychometric instruments to classify each individual trait and were mutually exclusive. Therefore, each trait measured the chance of engaging in drug abuse on its own and did not reflect the chance at the end of the spectrum. These findings show that individual traits can be either protective or risk factors for the drugs used among adolescents. Therefore, any adolescent with negative personality traits should be monitored closely by providing health education, motivation, counselling, and emotional support since it can be concluded that negative personality traits are correlated with high risk behaviours such as drug abuse [ 52 ].

Our study also found that a history of maltreatment has a positive association with adolescent drug abuse. Those adolescents with episodes of maltreatment were considered to have negative growth exposure, as their childhoods were negatively affected by traumatic events. Some significant associations were found between maltreatment and adolescent drug abuse, although the former factor was limited to the female gender [ 25 , 30 , 36 ]. One possible reason for the contrasting results between genders is the different sample populations, which only covered child welfare centers [ 36 ] and foster care [ 30 ]. Regardless of the place, maltreatment can happen anywhere depending on the presence of the perpetrators. To date, evidence that concretely links maltreatment and substance abuse remains limited. However, a plausible explanation for this link could be the indirect effects of posttraumatic stress (i.e., a history of maltreatment) leading to substance use [ 53 , 54 ]. These findings highlight the importance of continuous monitoring and follow-ups with adolescents who have a history of maltreatment and who have ever attended a welfare center.

Addiction sometimes leads to another addiction, as described by the findings of several studies [ 29 , 34 ]. An initial study focused on the effects of e-cigarettes in the development of other substance abuse disorders, particularly those related to marijuana, alcohol, and commonly prescribed medications [ 34 ]. The authors found that the use of e-cigarettes can lead to more severe substance addiction [ 55 ], possibly through normalization of the behavior. On the other hand, Chuang et al.’s extensive study in 2017 analyzed the combined effects of either multiple addictions alone or a combination of multiple addictions together with the impulsivity trait [ 29 ]. The outcomes reported were intriguing and provide the opportunity for targeted intervention. The synergistic effects of impulsiveness and three other substance addictions (marijuana, tobacco, and alcohol) substantially increased the likelihood for drug abuse from 3.46 (95%CI 1.25, 9.58) to 10.13 (95% CI 3.95, 25.95). Therefore, proper rehabilitation is an important strategy to ensure that one addiction will not lead to another addiction.

The likelihood for drug abuse increases as the population perceives little or no harmful risks associated with the drugs. On the opposite side of the coin, a greater perceived risk remains a protective factor for marijuana abuse [ 56 ]. However, another study noted that a stronger determinant for adolescent drug abuse was the perceived availability of the drug [ 35 , 57 ]. Looking at the bigger picture, both perceptions corroborate each other and may inform drug use. Another study, on the other hand, reported that there was a decreasing trend of perceived drug risk in conjunction with the increasing usage of drugs [ 58 ]. As more people do drugs, youth may inevitably perceive those drugs as an acceptable norm without any harmful consequences [ 59 ].

In addition, the total spent for screen time also contribute to drug abuse among adolescent [ 43 ]. This scenario has been proven by many researchers on the effect of screen time on the mental health [ 60 ] that leads to the substance use among the adolescent due to the ubiquity of pro-substance use content on the internet. Adolescent with comorbidity who needs medical pain management by opioids also tend to misuse in future. A qualitative exploration on the perspectives among general practitioners concerning the risk of opioid misuse in people with pain, showed pain management by opioids is a default treatment and misuse is not a main problem for the them [ 61 ]. A careful decision on the use of opioids as a pain management should be consider among the adolescents and their understanding is needed.

Within the family factor domain, family structures were found to have both positive and negative associations with drug abuse among adolescents. As described in one study, paternal knowledge was consistently found to be a protective factor against substance abuse [ 26 ]. With sufficient knowledge, the father can serve as the guardian of his family to monitor and protect his children from negative influences [ 62 ]. The work by Luk et al. also reported a positive association of maternal psychological association towards drug abuse (IRR 2.41, p  < 0.05) [ 26 ]. The authors also observed the same effect of paternal psychological control, although it was statistically insignificant. This construct relates to parenting style, and the authors argued that parenting style might have a profound effect on the outcomes under study. While an earlier literature review [ 63 ] also reported such a relationship, a recent study showed a lesser impact [ 64 ] with regards to neglectful parenting styles leading to poorer substance abuse outcomes. Nevertheless, it was highlighted in another study that the adolescents’ perception of a neglectful parenting style increased their odds (OR 2.14, p  = 0.012) of developing alcohol abuse, not the parenting style itself [ 65 ]. Altogether, families play vital roles in adolescents’ risk for engaging in substance abuse [ 66 ]. Therefore, any intervention to impede the initiation of substance use or curb existing substance use among adolescents needs to include parents—especially improving parent–child communication and ensuring that parents monitor their children’s activities.

Finally, the community also contributes to drug abuse among adolescents. As shown by Li et al. [ 32 ] and El Kazdouh et al. [ 46 ], peers exert a certain influence on other teenagers by making them subconsciously want to fit into the group. Peer selection and peer socialization processes might explain why peer pressure serves as a risk factor for drug-abuse among adolescents [ 67 ]. Another study reported that strong religious beliefs integrated into society play a crucial role in preventing adolescents from engaging in drug abuse [ 46 ]. Most religions devalue any actions that can cause harmful health effects, such as substance abuse [ 68 ]. Hence, spiritual beliefs may help protect adolescents. This theme has been well established in many studies [ 60 , 69 – 72 ] and, therefore, could be implemented by religious societies as part of interventions to curb the issue of adolescent drug abuse. The connection with school and structured activity did reduce the risk as a study in USA found exposure to media anti-drug messages had an indirect negative effect on substances abuse through school-related activity and social activity [ 73 ]. The school activity should highlight on the importance of developmental perspective when designing and offering school-based prevention programs [75].

Limitations

We adopted a review approach that synthesized existing evidence on the risk and protective factors of adolescents engaging in drug abuse. Although this systematic review builds on the conclusion of a rigorous review of studies in different settings, there are some potential limitations to this work. We may have missed some other important factors, as we only included English articles, and article extraction was only done from the three search engines mentioned. Nonetheless, this review focused on worldwide drug abuse studies, rather than the broader context of substance abuse including alcohol and cigarettes, thereby making this paper more focused.

Conclusions

This review has addressed some recent knowledge related to the individual, familial, and community risk and preventive factors for adolescent drug use. We suggest that more attention should be given to individual factors since most findings were discussed in relation to such factors. With the increasing trend of drug abuse, it will be critical to focus research specifically on this area. Localized studies, especially those related to demographic factors, may be more effective in generating results that are specific to particular areas and thus may be more useful in generating and assessing local control and prevention efforts. Interventions using different theory-based psychotherapies and a recognition of the unique developmental milestones specific to adolescents are among examples that can be used. Relevant holistic approaches should be strengthened not only by relevant government agencies but also by the private sector and non-governmental organizations by promoting protective factors while reducing risk factors in programs involving adolescents from primary school up to adulthood to prevent and control drug abuse. Finally, legal legislation and enforcement against drug abuse should be engaged with regularly as part of our commitment to combat this public health burden.

Acknowledgements

The authors acknowledge The Ministry of Higher Education Malaysia and The Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia, (UKM) for funding this study under the Long-Term Research Grant Scheme-(LGRS/1/2019/UKM-UKM/2/1). We also thank the team for their commitment and tireless efforts in ensuring that manuscript was well executed.

Authors’ contributions

Manuscript concept, and drafting AMN and RI; model development, FI, NI and NA.; Editing manuscript MRH, MRAN, NSS,; Critical revision of manuscript for important intellectual content, all authors. The authors read and approved the final manuscript.

Financial support for this study was obtained from the Ministry of Higher Education, Malaysia through the Long-Term Research Grant Scheme-(LGRS/1/2019/UKM-UKM/2/1). The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript.

Data availability and materials

Declarations.

This study was approved by the Ethics Committee of the Secretariat of Research Ethics, Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia, Faculty of Medicine, Cheras, Kuala Lumpur (Reference no. UKMPPI/111/8/JEP-2020.174(2). Dated 27 Mac 2020.

Not applicable.

The authors AMN, RI, FI, MRM, MRAM, NA, NI NSS declare that they have no conflict of interest relevant to this work.

Publisher’s Note

Springer Nature remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations.

More teens than ever are overdosing. Psychologists are leading new approaches to combat youth substance misuse

“Just Say No” didn’t work , but experts are employing new holistic programs to help steer kids away—or at least keep them from dying—from illicit substances.

Vol. 55 No. 2 Print version: page 48

• Substance Use, Abuse, and Addiction

For years, students in middle and high schools across the country were urged to “just say no” to drugs and alcohol. But it’s no secret that the Drug Abuse Resistance Education (D.A.R.E.) program, which was typically delivered by police officers who urged total abstinence, didn’t work. A meta-analysis found the program largely ineffective and one study even showed that kids who completed D.A.R.E. were more likely than their peers to take drugs ( Ennett, S. T., et al., American Journal of Public Health , Vol. 84, No. 9, 1994 ; Rosenbaum, D. P., & Hanson, G. S., Journal of Research in Crime and Delinquency , Vol. 35, No. 4, 1998 ).

“We know that the ‘Just Say No’ campaign doesn’t work. It’s based in pure risks, and that doesn’t resonate with teens,” said developmental psychologist Bonnie Halpern-Felsher, PhD, a professor of pediatrics and founder and executive director of several substance use prevention and intervention curriculums at Stanford University. “There are real and perceived benefits to using drugs, as well as risks, such as coping with stress or liking the ‘high.’ If we only talk about the negatives, we lose our credibility.”

Partially because of the lessons learned from D.A.R.E., many communities are taking a different approach to addressing youth substance use. They’re also responding to very real changes in the drug landscape. Aside from vaping, adolescent use of illicit substances has dropped substantially over the past few decades, but more teens are overdosing than ever—largely because of contamination of the drug supply with fentanyl, as well as the availability of stronger substances ( Most reported substance use among adolescents held steady in 2022, National Institute on Drug Abuse ).

“The goal is to impress upon youth that far and away the healthiest choice is not to put these substances in your body, while at the same time acknowledging that some kids are still going to try them,” said Aaron Weiner, PhD, ABPP, a licensed clinical psychologist based in Lake Forest, Illinois, and immediate past-president of APA’s Division 50 (Society of Addiction Psychology). “If that’s the case, we want to help them avoid the worst consequences.”

While that approach, which incorporates principles of harm reduction, is not universally accepted, evidence is growing for its ability to protect youth from accidental overdoses and other consequences of substance use, including addiction, justice involvement, and problems at school. Psychologists have been a key part of the effort to create, test, and administer developmentally appropriate, evidence-based programs that approach prevention in a holistic, nonstigmatizing way.

“Drugs cannot be this taboo thing that young people can’t ask about anymore,” said Nina Christie, PhD, a postdoctoral research fellow in the Center on Alcohol, Substance Use, and Addictions at the University of New Mexico. “That’s just a recipe for young people dying, and we can’t continue to allow that.”

Changes in drug use

In 2022, about 1 in 3 high school seniors, 1 in 5 sophomores, and 1 in 10 eighth graders reported using an illicit substance in the past year, according to the National Institute on Drug Abuse’s (NIDA) annual survey ( Monitoring the Future: National Survey Results on Drug Use, 1975–2022: Secondary School Students , NIDA, 2023 [PDF, 7.78MB] ). Those numbers were down significantly from prepandemic levels and essentially at their lowest point in decades.

Substance use during adolescence is particularly dangerous because psychoactive substances, including nicotine, cannabis, and alcohol, can interfere with healthy brain development ( Winters, K. C., & Arria, A., Prevention Research , Vol. 18, No. 2, 2011 ). Young people who use substances early and frequently also face a higher risk of developing a substance use disorder in adulthood ( McCabe, S. E., et al., JAMA Network Open , Vol. 5, No. 4, 2022 ). Kids who avoid regular substance use are more likely to succeed in school and to avoid problems with the juvenile justice system ( Public policy statement on prevention, American Society of Addiction Medicine, 2023 ).

“The longer we can get kids to go without using substances regularly, the better their chances of having an optimal life trajectory,” Weiner said.

The drugs young people are using—and the way they’re using them—have also changed, and psychologists say this needs to inform educational efforts around substance use. Alcohol and cocaine are less popular than they were in the 1990s; use of cannabis and hallucinogens, which are now more salient and easier to obtain, were higher than ever among young adults in 2021 ( Marijuana and hallucinogen use among young adults reached all-time high in 2021, NIDA ).

“Gen Z is drinking less alcohol than previous generations, but they seem to be increasingly interested in psychedelics and cannabis,” Christie said. “Those substances have kind of replaced alcohol as the cool thing to be doing.”

Young people are also seeing and sharing content about substance use on social media, with a rise in posts and influencers promoting vaping on TikTok and other platforms ( Vassey, J., et al., Nicotine & Tobacco Research , 2023 ). Research suggests that adolescents and young adults who see tobacco or nicotine content on social media are more likely to later start using it ( Donaldson, S. I., et al., JAMA Pediatrics , Vol. 176, No. 9, 2022 ).

A more holistic view

Concern for youth well-being is what drove the well-intentioned, but ultimately ineffective, “mad rush for abstinence,” as Robert Schwebel, PhD, calls it. Though that approach has been unsuccessful in many settings, a large number of communities still employ it, said Schwebel, a clinical psychologist who created the Seven Challenges Program for treating substance use in youth.

But increasingly, those working to prevent and treat youth substance use are taking a different approach—one that aligns with principles Schwebel helped popularize through Seven Challenges.

A key tenet of modern prevention and treatment programs is empowering youth to make their own decisions around substance use in a developmentally appropriate way. Adolescents are exploring their identities (including how they personally relate to drugs), learning how to weigh the consequences of their actions, and preparing for adulthood, which involves making choices about their future. The Seven Challenges Program, for example, uses supportive journaling exercises, combined with counseling, to help young people practice informed decision-making around substance use with those processes in mind.

“You can insist until you’re blue in the face, but that’s not going to make people abstinent. They ultimately have to make their own decisions,” Schwebel said.

Today’s prevention efforts also tend to be more holistic than their predecessors, accounting for the ways drug use relates to other addictive behaviors, such as gaming and gambling, or risky choices, such as fighting, drag racing, and having unprotected sex. Risk factors for substance use—which include trauma, adverse childhood experiences, parental history of substance misuse, and personality factors such as impulsivity and sensation seeking—overlap with many of those behaviors, so it often makes sense to address them collectively.

[ Related: Psychologists are innovating to tackle substance use ]

“We’ve become more sophisticated in understanding the biopsychosocial determinants of alcohol and drug use and moving beyond this idea that it’s a disease and the only solution is medication,” said James Murphy, PhD, a professor of psychology at the University of Memphis who studies addictive behaviors and how to intervene.

Modern prevention programs also acknowledge that young people use substances to serve a purpose—typically either social or emotional in nature—and if adults expect them not to use, they should help teens learn to fulfill those needs in a different way, Weiner said.

“Youth are generally using substances to gain friends, avoid losing them, or to cope with emotional problems that they’re having,” he said. “Effective prevention efforts need to offer healthy alternatives for achieving those goals.”

Just say “know”

At times, the tenets of harm reduction and substance use prevention seem inherently misaligned. Harm reduction, born out of a response to the AIDS crisis, prioritizes bodily autonomy and meeting people where they are without judgment. For some harm reductionists, actively encouraging teens against using drugs could violate the principle of respecting autonomy, Weiner said.

On the other hand, traditional prevention advocates may feel that teaching adolescents how to use fentanyl test strips or encouraging them not to use drugs alone undermines the idea that they can choose not to use substances. But Weiner says both approaches can be part of the solution.

“It doesn’t have to be either prevention or harm reduction, and we lose really important tools when we say it has to be one or the other,” he said.

In adults, harm reduction approaches save lives, prevent disease transmission, and help people connect with substance use treatment ( Harm Reduction, NIDA, 2022 ). Early evidence shows similar interventions can help adolescents improve their knowledge and decision-making around drug use ( Fischer, N. R., Substance Abuse Treatment, Prevention, and Policy , Vol. 17, 2022 ). Teens are enthusiastic about these programs, which experts often call “Just Say Know” to contrast them with the traditional “Just Say No” approach. In one pilot study, 94% of students said a “Just Say Know” program provided helpful information and 92% said it might influence their approach to substance use ( Meredith, L. R., et al., The American Journal of Drug and Alcohol Abuse , Vol. 47, No. 1, 2021 ).

“Obviously, it’s the healthiest thing if we remove substance use from kids’ lives while their brains are developing. At the same time, my preference is that we do something that will have a positive impact on these kids’ health and behaviors,” said Nora Charles, PhD, an associate professor and head of the Youth Substance Use and Risky Behavior Lab at the University of Southern Mississippi. “If the way to do that is to encourage more sensible and careful engagement with illicit substances, that is still better than not addressing the problem.”

One thing not to do is to overly normalize drug use or to imply that it is widespread, Weiner said. Data show that it’s not accurate to say that most teens have used drugs in the past year or that drugs are “just a part of high school life.” In fact, students tend to overestimate how many of their peers use substances ( Dumas, T. M., et al., Addictive Behaviors , Vol. 90, 2019 ; Helms, S. W., et al., Developmental Psychology , Vol. 50, No. 12, 2014 ).

A way to incorporate both harm reduction and traditional prevention is to customize solutions to the needs of various communities. For example, in 2022, five Alabama high school students overdosed on a substance laced with fentanyl, suggesting that harm reduction strategies could save lives in that community. Other schools with less reported substance use might benefit more from a primary prevention-style program.

At Stanford, Halpern-Felsher’s Research and Education to Empower Adolescents and Young Adults to Choose Health (REACH) Lab has developed a series of free, evidence-based programs through community-based participatory research that can help populations with different needs. The REACH Lab offers activity-based prevention, intervention, and cessation programs for elementary, middle, and high school students, including curricula on alcohol, vaping, cannabis, fentanyl, and other drugs ( Current Problems in Pediatric and Adolescent Health Care , Vol. 52, No. 6, 2022 ). They’re also working on custom curricula for high-risk groups, including sexual and gender minorities.

The REACH Lab programs, including the comprehensive Safety First curriculum , incorporate honest discussion about the risks and benefits of using substances. For example: Drugs are one way to cope with stress, but exercise, sleep, and eating well can also help. Because many young people care about the environment, one lesson explores how cannabis and tobacco production causes environmental harm.

The programs also dispel myths about how many adolescents are using substances and help them practice skills, such as how to decline an offer to use drugs in a way that resonates with them. They learn about the developing brain in a positive way—whereas teens were long told they can’t make good decisions, Safety First empowers them to choose to protect their brains and bodies by making healthy choices across the board.

“Teens can make good decisions,” Halpern-Felsher said. “The equation is just different because they care more about certain things—peers, relationships—compared to adults.”

Motivating young people

Because substance use and mental health are so intertwined, some programs can do prevention successfully with very little drug-focused content. In one of the PreVenture Program’s workshops for teens, only half a page in a 35-page workbook explicitly mentions substances.

“That’s what’s fascinating about the evidence base for PreVenture,” said clinical psychologist Patricia Conrod, PhD, a professor of psychiatry at the University of Montreal who developed the program. “You can have quite a dramatic effect on young people’s substance use without even talking about it.”

PreVenture offers a series of 90-minute workshops that apply cognitive behavioral insights upstream (addressing the root causes of a potential issue rather than waiting for symptoms to emerge) to help young people explore their personality traits and develop healthy coping strategies to achieve their long-term goals.

Adolescents high in impulsivity, hopelessness, thrill-seeking, or anxiety sensitivity face higher risks of mental health difficulties and substance use, so the personalized material helps them practice healthy coping based on their personality type. For example, the PreVenture workshop that targets anxiety sensitivity helps young people learn to challenge cognitive distortions that can cause stress, then ties that skill back to their own goals.

The intervention can be customized to the needs of a given community (in one trial, drag racing outstripped substance use as the most problematic thrill-seeking behavior). In several randomized controlled trials of PreVenture, adolescents who completed the program started using substances later than peers who did not receive the intervention and faced fewer alcohol-related harms ( Newton, N. C., et al., JAMA Network Open , Vol. 5, No. 11, 2022 ). The program has also been shown to reduce the likelihood that adolescents will experiment with illicit substances, which relates to the current overdose crisis in North America, Conrod said ( Archives of General Psychiatry , Vol. 67, No. 1, 2010 ).

“People shouldn’t shy away from a targeted approach like this,” Conrod said. “Young people report that having the words and skills to manage their traits is actually helpful, and the research shows that at behavioral level, it really does protect them.”

As young people leave secondary school and enter college or adult life, about 30% will binge drink, 8% will engage in heavy alcohol use, and 20% will use illicit drugs ( Alcohol and Young Adults Ages 18 to 24, National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism, 2023 ; SAMHSA announces national survey on drug use and health (NSDUH) results detailing mental illness and substance use levels in 2021 ). But young people are very unlikely to seek help, even if those activities cause them distress, Murphy said. For that reason, brief interventions that leverage motivational interviewing and can be delivered in a school, work, or medical setting can make a big difference.

In an intervention Murphy and his colleagues are testing, young adults complete a questionnaire about how often they drink or use drugs, how much money they spend on substances, and negative things that have happened as a result of those choices (getting into an argument or having a hangover, for example).

In an hour-long counseling session, they then have a nonjudgmental conversation about their substance use, where the counselor gently amplifies any statements the young person makes about negative outcomes or a desire to change their behavior. Participants also see charts that quantify how much money and time they spend on substances, including recovering from being intoxicated, and how that stacks up against other things they value, such as exercise, family time, and hobbies.

“For many young people, when they look at what they allocate to drinking and drug use, relative to these other things that they view as much more important, it’s often very motivating,” Murphy said.

A meta-analysis of brief alcohol interventions shows that they can reduce the average amount participants drink for at least 6 months ( Mun, E.Y., et al., Prevention Science , Vol. 24, No. 8, 2023 ). Even a small reduction in alcohol use can be life-altering, Murphy said. The fourth or fifth drink on a night out, for example, could be the one that leads to negative consequences—so reducing intake to just three drinks may make a big difference for young people.

Conrod and her colleagues have also adapted the PreVenture Program for university students; they are currently testing its efficacy in a randomized trial across multiple institutions.

Christie is also focused on the young adult population. As a policy intern with Students for Sensible Drug Policy, she created a handbook of evidence-based policies that college campuses can use to reduce harm among students but still remain compliant with federal law. For example, the Drug Free Schools and Communities Act mandates that higher education institutions formally state that illegal drug use is not allowed on campus but does not bar universities from taking an educational or harm reduction-based approach if students violate that policy.

“One low-hanging fruit is for universities to implement a Good Samaritan policy, where students can call for help during a medical emergency and won’t get in trouble, even if illegal substance use is underway,” she said.

Ultimately, taking a step back to keep the larger goals in focus—as well as staying dedicated to prevention and intervention approaches backed by science—is what will help keep young people healthy and safe, Weiner said.

“What everyone can agree on is that we want kids to have the best life they can,” he said. “If we can start there, what tools do we have available to help?”

Further reading

Public Policy Statement on Prevention American Society of Addiction Medicine, 2023

Listen to young people: How to implement harm reduction in the collegiate setting Christie, N. C., 2023

Brief alcohol interventions for young adults: Strengthening effects and disentangling mechanisms to build personalized interventions for widespread uptake Special issue of Psychology of Addictive Behaviors , 2022

Addressing adolescent substance use with a public health prevention framework: The case for harm reduction Winer, J. M., et al., Annals of Medicine , 2022

A breath of knowledge: Overview of current adolescent e-cigarette prevention and cessation programs Liu, J., et al., Current Addiction Reports , 2020

Recommended Reading

Six things psychologists are talking about.

The APA Monitor on Psychology ® sister e-newsletter offers fresh articles on psychology trends, new research, and more.

Welcome! Thank you for subscribing.

Speaking of Psychology

Subscribe to APA’s audio podcast series highlighting some of the most important and relevant psychological research being conducted today.

Subscribe to Speaking of Psychology and download via:

Contact APA

You may also like.

• Drug and Alcohol Abuse Treatment Effectiveness Words: 578
• The Consequences of Drug Abuse Words: 1394
• Alcohol and Drug Abuse in the Workplace Words: 840
• Drug Abuse among Teenagers Causes and Effects Words: 1377
• Alcohol Abuse as It Pertains to High Risk Families Words: 1767
• Alcohol Abuse’ Treatment Among the Elderly Words: 8387
• Drug Prescription Issues and Abuse Words: 1447
• The Problems of Drug Misuse and Abuse and Their Management Words: 1555
• Crisis of Chemical Dependence: Drug Abuse Words: 827
• Drug Misuse, Abuse, and Their Factors Words: 1088
• Social Problems Related to Alcohol and Drugs Words: 564
• The Treatment of Alcohol Abuse among the Elderly Words: 5329

Drug and Alcohol Abuse among Young People

Alcohol abuse essay introduction, health problems, social consequences, drug abuse conclusion essay, works cited.

Alcoholism and drug addiction are considered not only purely medical but also social problems of modern society. Alcohol and drug abuse have been known since ancient times and have now extended to disturbing proportions in the world community.

Even when limiting alcohol and drug abuse to legally permissible levels, many countries recognize them as a social disaster.

The recognition of alcohol and drug abuse (with certain exclusions regarding social drinking) as threatening problems is widely accepted beyond national borders and social characteristics. At the same time, this problem is even more concerning regarding its occurrence in the young generation. This paper will examine the fact that drug and alcohol abuse is a serious problem among young people.

The use of alcohol and drugs currently presents the most serious threat to the health and well-being of many young people. In regards to alcohol, the conclusion of public health services is clear: there is no scientific acknowledgment of a safe limit of the consumption of alcohol. It is especially so when it concerns children and teenagers, who are the most vulnerable population.

Regarding drugs, the most horrifying consequences are concerned with fatal outcomes. For example, “In 1989, there were 1,200 deaths in the United Kingdom where the underlying cause was attributed to drug dependence or non-dependent abuse of drugs or controlled drugs were somehow implicated as a cause.” (Plant, and Plant 72)

There are many alcohol and drug-related health issues, but fatal outcomes are definitely their most dangerous consequences. In the case of alcohol, driving can be seen as a serious threat. According to statistics, “The rate of fatal crashes among alcohol-involved drivers between 16 and 20 years old is more than twice the rate for alcohol-involved drivers 21 and older.” (“The Health Effects of Teen Alcohol Use”)

Moreover, the interaction of alcohol with such conditions as depression can lead to suicide, which is “the third leading cause of death among people between the ages of 14 and 25.” (“The Health Effects of Teen Alcohol Use”)

Violence can be considered a direct consequence of alcohol and drug abuse. Violence among young people is a massive problem in our society, and its extent is difficult to determine. The impact of drug and alcohol abuse on young people can go in both directions, where they can be the ones applying violence and its victims.

An annual survey conducted by The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services shows, as of 2000, that “illicit drug users were also about 16 times more likely than nonusers to report being arrested and booked for larceny or theft; more than 14 times more likely to be arrested and booked for such offenses as driving under the influence, drunkenness, or liquor law violations; and more than 9 times more likely to be arrested and booked on an assault charge. (“Drug-Related Crime”) Victims of violence are often raised in a family where one or both parents abuse alcohol and drugs.

Explaining the background of such families, it should be mentioned that several factors lead to such violent environment, where kids are raised in “poverty, often with drug and alcohol problems, in neighborhoods where drugs and crime are common and jobs are scarce.” (“Covering Child Abuse”)

The social consequences of alcohol and drug abuse lie within the reasons people using such substances. Aside from such factors as curiosity, risk-taking, and imitation, many people are using drugs and alcohol to escape reality or some stressful life events.

Accordingly, if these substances were heavily abused for a long time, it can make the users emotionally unadapted, feeling uncomfortable in public, having difficulties coping with life obstacles, and lacking social interests or plans for the future.

Another consequence can be seen through forming specific groups of friends who share the same habits, and thus making a circle that is hard to escape. This can affect education, where “studies have shown that school drop-out is more common among heavy-drinking students than among others.” (Klingemann)

It can be seen through the consequences discussed above that alcohol and drug abuse among young people is indeed posing a serious social problem. However, these consequences are only small parts of the problem of young people using drugs and alcohol.

The most considerable concern regarding the young generation is that they are the foundation for the future. Governments and countries are trying to erase many past mistakes by raising and encouraging a generation that will have the best characteristics. These characteristics will allow them to keep the nation strong. This can become quite difficult when this foundation is facing serious problems.

“Covering Child Abuse.” American Journalism Review Sept. 1997: 1+.

“Drug-Related Crime”. 2000. Drug policy Information Clearing House.Web.

“The Health Effects of Teen Alcohol Use”. 2008. Teen Drug Abuse.

Klingemann, Harald. “Alcohol and Its Social Consequences – the Forgotten Dimension”. 2001. World Health Organization Regional Office for Europe.

Plant, Martin, and Moira Plant. Risk-Takers: Alcohol, Drugs, Sex, and Youth. New York: Tavistock Routledge, 1992.

Cite this paper

• Chicago (N-B)
• Chicago (A-D)

StudyCorgi. (2020, January 13). Drug and Alcohol Abuse among Young People. https://studycorgi.com/drug-and-alcohol-abuse-among-young-people/

"Drug and Alcohol Abuse among Young People." StudyCorgi , 13 Jan. 2020, studycorgi.com/drug-and-alcohol-abuse-among-young-people/.

StudyCorgi . (2020) 'Drug and Alcohol Abuse among Young People'. 13 January.

1. StudyCorgi . "Drug and Alcohol Abuse among Young People." January 13, 2020. https://studycorgi.com/drug-and-alcohol-abuse-among-young-people/.

Bibliography

StudyCorgi . "Drug and Alcohol Abuse among Young People." January 13, 2020. https://studycorgi.com/drug-and-alcohol-abuse-among-young-people/.

StudyCorgi . 2020. "Drug and Alcohol Abuse among Young People." January 13, 2020. https://studycorgi.com/drug-and-alcohol-abuse-among-young-people/.

This paper, “Drug and Alcohol Abuse among Young People”, was written and voluntary submitted to our free essay database by a straight-A student. Please ensure you properly reference the paper if you're using it to write your assignment.

Before publication, the StudyCorgi editorial team proofread and checked the paper to make sure it meets the highest standards in terms of grammar, punctuation, style, fact accuracy, copyright issues, and inclusive language. Last updated: November 8, 2023 .

If you are the author of this paper and no longer wish to have it published on StudyCorgi, request the removal . Please use the “ Donate your paper ” form to submit an essay.

Home — Essay Samples — Nursing & Health — Teenage Drug Abuse — Drug and Alcohol Abuse Among Teenagers

Drug and Alcohol Abuse Among Teenagers

• Categories: Alcohol Abuse Teenage Drug Abuse Teenagers

About this sample

Words: 1818 |

10 min read

Published: Sep 1, 2020

Words: 1818 | Pages: 4 | 10 min read

Table of contents

Introduction, types of drugs abused by teenagers, effects of drug and alcohol abuse on teenagers, preventive measures, alcohol abuse, marijuana use among teenagers, prescription drug abuse, physical health effects, mental health effects, references:.

• National Institute on Drug Abuse. (2020). Drugs, brains, and behavior: The science of addiction. https://www.drugabuse.gov/publications/drugs-brains-behavior-science-addiction/drug-abuse-addiction
• Johnston, L. D., Miech, R. A., O’Malley, P. M., Bachman, J. G., Schulenberg, J. E., & Patrick, M. E. (2019). Monitoring the Future national survey results on drug use, 1975–2018: Overview, key findings on adolescent drug use. Institute for Social Research, The University of Michigan. http://www.monitoringthefuture.org/pubs/monographs/mtf-overview2018.pdf
• Center for Behavioral Health Statistics and Quality. (2020). 2019 National Survey on Drug Use and Health: Detailed tables. Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration. https://www.samhsa.gov/data/sites/default/files/reports/rpt29394/2019NSDUHDetailedTabsHTML/NSDUHDetTabsSect1pe2019.htm
• Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration. (2020). Key substance use and mental health indicators in the United States: Results from the 2019 National Survey on Drug Use and Health (HHS Publication No. PEP20-07-01-001, NSDUH Series H-55). https://www.samhsa.gov/data/sites/default/files/reports/rpt29393/2019NSDUHFFRPDFWHTML/2019NSDUHFFR1PDFW090120.pdf
• Volkow, N. D., Koob, G. F., & McLellan, A. T. (2016). Neurobiologic advances from the brain disease model of addiction. New England Journal of Medicine, 374(4), 363–371. https://doi.org/10.1056/NEJMra1511480
• Degenhardt, L., Charlson, F., Ferrari, A., Santomauro, D., Erskine, H., Mantilla-Herrara, A., Whiteford, H., Leung, J., Naghavi, M., Griswold, M., Rehm, J., Hall, W., Sartorius, B., & Scott, J. (2018). The global burden of disease attributable to alcohol and drug use in 195 countries and territories, 1990–2016: A systematic analysis for the Global Burden of Disease Study 2016. The Lancet Psychiatry, 5(12), 987–1012. https://doi.org/10.1016/S2215-0366(18)30337-7
• National Institute on Drug Abuse. (2019). Monitoring the Future study: Trends in prevalence of various drugs. https://www.drugabuse.gov/drug-topics/trends-statistics/monitoring-future/monitoring-future-study-trends-in-prevalence-various-drugs
• McCabe, S. E., West, B. T., Veliz, P., McCabe, V. V., Stoddard, S. A., & Boyd, C. J. (2019). Trends in medical and nonmedical use of prescription opioids among US adolescents: 1976–2015. Pediatrics, 143(3), e20182717. https://doi.org/10.1542/peds.2018-2717

Cite this Essay

Let us write you an essay from scratch

• 450+ experts on 30 subjects ready to help
• Custom essay delivered in as few as 3 hours

Get high-quality help

Dr. Heisenberg

Verified writer

• Expert in: Nursing & Health Sociology

+ 120 experts online

By clicking “Check Writers’ Offers”, you agree to our terms of service and privacy policy . We’ll occasionally send you promo and account related email

No need to pay just yet!

Related Essays

1 pages / 514 words

1 pages / 661 words

1 pages / 499 words

3 pages / 1162 words

Remember! This is just a sample.

You can get your custom paper by one of our expert writers.

121 writers online

Still can’t find what you need?

Browse our vast selection of original essay samples, each expertly formatted and styled

Related Essays on Teenage Drug Abuse

Why is it important to say no to drugs essay delves into the critical topic of substance abuse and its implications for individuals and society. Saying no to drugs is a resounding call to prioritize one's health, well-being, and [...]

The scourge of drug abuse continues to plague societies worldwide, affecting individuals, families, and communities alike. Despite extensive awareness campaigns, legislation, and rehabilitation efforts, the incidence of drug [...]

Center for Behavioral Health Statistics and Quality. (2016). Behavioral health trends in the United States: Results from the 2016 National Survey on Drug Use and Health. Substance Abuse and Mental Health [...]

As a student, understanding the gravity of the issue, you might wonder, "What can you do to prevent drug abuse?" The alarming rise in drug abuse among teenagers has become a pressing concern for parents, educators, and society [...]

  The human body is incredibly fragile. Countless things in the world can change how well the body functions. One such thing is cigarettes. At some point, the population has learned about the dangerous effects of [...]

Drug addiction is something societies all over the world rarely accept. People who say, “A glass of beer after a long work day keeps me relaxed and ready for the next day of work” sounds normal. However a phrase just like the [...]

Related Topics

By clicking “Send”, you agree to our Terms of service and Privacy statement . We will occasionally send you account related emails.

Where do you want us to send this sample?

By clicking “Continue”, you agree to our terms of service and privacy policy.

Be careful. This essay is not unique

This essay was donated by a student and is likely to have been used and submitted before

Download this Sample

Free samples may contain mistakes and not unique parts

Sorry, we could not paraphrase this essay. Our professional writers can rewrite it and get you a unique paper.

Please check your inbox.

We can write you a custom essay that will follow your exact instructions and meet the deadlines. Let's fix your grades together!

Get Your Personalized Essay in 3 Hours or Less!

We use cookies to personalyze your web-site experience. By continuing we’ll assume you board with our cookie policy .

• Instructions Followed To The Letter
• Deadlines Met At Every Stage
• Unique And Plagiarism Free

• Open access
• Published: 07 November 2021

How to prevent alcohol and illicit drug use among students in affluent areas: a qualitative study on motivation and attitudes towards prevention

• Pia Kvillemo   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0002-9706-4902 1 ,
• Linda Hiltunen 2 ,
• Youstina Demetry 3 ,
• Anna-Karin Carlander 4 ,
• Tim Hansson 5 ,
• Johanna Gripenberg 1 ,
• Tobias H. Elgán 1 ,
• Kim Einhorn 4 &
• Charlotte Skoglund 1 , 4  

Substance Abuse Treatment, Prevention, and Policy volume  16 , Article number:  83 ( 2021 ) Cite this article

14k Accesses

5 Citations

3 Altmetric

Metrics details

The use of alcohol and illicit drugs during adolescence can lead to serious short- and long-term health related consequences. Despite a global trend of decreased substance use, in particular alcohol, among adolescents, evidence suggests excessive use of substances by young people in socioeconomically affluent areas. To prevent substance use-related harm, we need in-depth knowledge about the reasons for substance use in this group and how they perceive various prevention interventions. The aim of the current study was to explore motives for using or abstaining from using substances among students in affluent areas as well as their attitudes to, and suggestions for, substance use prevention.

Twenty high school students (age 15–19 years) in a Swedish affluent municipality were recruited through purposive sampling to take part in semi-structured interviews. Qualitative content analysis of transcribed interviews was performed.

The most prominent motive for substance use appears to be a desire to feel a part of the social milieu and to have high social status within the peer group. Motives for abstaining included academic ambitions, activities requiring sobriety and parental influence. Students reported universal information-based prevention to be irrelevant and hesitation to use selective prevention interventions due to fear of being reported to authorities. Suggested universal prevention concerned reliable information from credible sources, stricter substance control measures for those providing substances, parental involvement, and social leisure activities without substance use. Suggested selective prevention included guaranteed confidentiality and non-judging encounters when seeking help.

Conclusions

Future research on substance use prevention targeting students in affluent areas should take into account the social milieu and with advantage pay attention to students’ suggestions on credible prevention information, stricter control measures for substance providers, parental involvement, substance-free leisure, and confidential ways to seek help with a non-judging approach from adults.

Alcohol consumption and illicit drug use are major public health concerns causing great individual suffering as well as substantial societal costs [ 1 , 2 ]. Early onset of substance use is especially problematic since the developing brain is vulnerable to the effects of alcohol and drugs, increasing the risk of long-term negative effects, such as harmful use, addiction, and mental health problems [ 3 , 4 , 5 , 6 ]. Short-term consequences of substance use include intoxication [ 5 , 7 ], accidents [ 8 [, academic failure [ 9 ], and interaction with legal authorities [ 10 ], which calls for effective substance use prevention in adolescents and young adults. Such prevention interventions may be universal, targeting the general population, e.g., legal measures and school based programs, or selective, targeting certain vulnerable at-risk groups, i.e., subsections of the population [ 11 ]. Selective prevention can be carried out within a universal prevention setting, such as health care or school, but also be delivered directly to the group which it aims to target, face-to-face or digitally [ 12 , 13 , 14 , 15 ].

The motives to use substances are governed by a number of personal, social and environmental factors [ 16 ], ranging from personal knowledge, abilities, beliefs and attitudes, to the influence of family, friends and society [ 17 , 18 , 19 , 20 ]. Cooper and colleagues [ 21 ] have previously identified a number of motives for drinking, i.e., 1) enhancement (drinking to maintain or amplify positive affect), 2) coping (drinking to avoid or dull negative affect), 3) social (drinking to improve parties or gatherings), and 4) conformity (drinking due to social pressure or a need to fit in). Similar motives for illicit drug use have been found by e.g. Kettner and colleagues, who highlighted the attainment of euphoria and enhancement of activities as prominent motives for use of psychoactive substances among people using psychedelics in parallel with other substances [ 22 ], along with Boys and colleagues [ 23 , 24 , 25 ], who reported on changing mood (e.g., to stop worrying about a problem) and social purposes (e.g., to enjoy the company of friends) as motives for using illicit drugs among young people. Additionally, the authors found that the facilitation of activities (e.g., to concentrate, to work/study), physical effects (e.g., to lose weight), and the managing of the effects of other substances (e.g., to ease or improve) motivated young people to use illicit drugs.

Prior research has repeatedly shown that low socioeconomic status is a risk factor for substance use and related problems [ 26 , 27 , 28 ]. However, recent research from Canada [ 29 ], the United States [ 30 , 31 , 32 ], Serbia [ 33 ], Switzerland [ 34 ], and Sweden [ 35 ] suggest that high socioeconomic status too is associated with excessive substance use among young people, although for other reasons [ 29 , 30 , 31 , 32 , 33 , 34 ]. Previous research has highlighted two main explanations for excessive substance use among young people in families with high socioeconomic status; i) exceptionally high requirements to perform in both school and leisure activities and ii) absence of adult contact, emotionally and physically, due to parents in resourceful and affluent areas spending a lot of time on their work and careers [ 36 , 37 ]. In addition to these explanations, high physical and social availability due to substantial economic resources and a social milieu were substance use is a natural element, may enable extensive substance use among economically privileged young people [ 30 , 38 , 39 ].

In parallel with identification of various groups at risk for extensive substance use, a growing number of young people globally abstain from using substances [ 1 , 40 , 41 ]. By analyzing data derived from a nationally representative sample of American high school students, Levy and colleagues [ 40 ] found an increasing percentage of 12th-graders reporting no current (past 30 days) substance use between 1976 and 2014, showing that a growing proportion of high school students are motivated to abstain from substance use. However, while this global decrease in substance use among adolescents is mirrored in Swedish youths, in particular alcohol use, a more detailed investigation shows large discrepancies across different socioeconomic and geographic areas. Affluent areas in Sweden stand out as breaking the trend, showing increasing alcohol and illicit drug use among adolescents [ 42 , 43 ].

To date, we lack in-depth knowledge of why youths in affluent areas keep using alcohol and illicit drugs excessively. Furthermore, despite implementation of various strategies and interventions over the last decades [ 14 , 44 , 45 , 46 , 47 , 48 ], we have yet no clear guidelines on how to effectively prevent substance use in this specific group, although the importance of parents’ role for preventing substance use in privileged adolescents has been highlighted in a recent study [ 29 ]. Moreover, despite the fact that attitudes are assumed to guide behavior [ 49 , 50 ] and consequently the reception and effects (behavior change) of prevention interventions, the knowledge about affluent adolescents’ attitudes toward current substance use prevention interventions remains limited. To our knowledge, the only study exploring adolescents’ attitudes to substance use prevention was carried out among Spanish adolescents who participated in “open-air gatherings of binge drinkers”. The study concerned adolescents irrespective of their economic background and revealed positive attitudes to restrictions for drunk people [ 19 ]. Thus, extended knowledge on what motivates young people in affluent areas to excessively use substances, or abstaining from using, as well as their attitudes to prevention is warranted.

In the current study, we aim to explore motives for using, or abstaining from using, substances among students in affluent areas. In addition, we aim to explore their attitudes to and suggestions for substance use prevention. The findings may make a valuable contribution to the research on tailored substance use prevention for groups of adolescents that may not be sufficiently supported by current prevention strategies.

A qualitative interview study was performed among high school students in one of Stockholm county’s most affluent municipalities. The research team developed a semi-structured interview guide (supplementary Interview guide) covering issues regarding the individual’s physical and mental health, extent of alcohol and illicit drug use, motives for use or abstinence, relationships with peers and family, alcohol and drug related norms among peers, family and in the society, and attitudes towards strategies to prevent substance use. Examples of interview questions are: How would you describe your health? Which are the main reasons why young people drink, do you think? How do you get hold of alcohol as a teenager?

What do you know about drug use among young people in Municipality X? How would you describe your social relationships with peers in and outside Municipality X?

The study was approved by the Swedish Ethical Review Authority (dnr. 2019–02646).

Study setting

Sweden has strict regulations of alcohol and illicit drugs compared to many other countries [ 45 , 46 ]. Alcohol beverages (> 3.5% alcohol content by volume) can only be bought at the Swedish Alcohol Retailing Monopoly “Systembolaget” by people 20 years of age or older, or at licensed premises (e.g., bars, restaurants, clubs), at the minimum age of 18 years. The use of illicit drugs is criminalized. The study was carried out in a municipality with 45% higher annual median income than the corresponding figure for all of Sweden, along with the highest educational level among all Swedish municipalities, i.e., 58% of the population (25 years and over) having graduated from university and hold professional degrees, as compared with the national average of 26%. Furthermore, only 6.1% of the inhabitants receive public assistance, compared to a national average of 13.4% [ 51 ].

Recruitment

Purposive sampling was used to recruit students from the three high schools located in the selected municipality. Contact was established by the research team with the principals of the high schools that agreed to participate in the study. Information and invitation to participate in the study was published on the schools’ online platforms, visible for parents and students. Students communicated their initial interest in participating to the assistant principal. Upon consent from the students, the assistant principal forwarded mobile phone numbers of eligible students to the research team. Also, students from other schools in the selected municipality were asked by friends to participate and upon contact with the research team were invited to participate. Forty students signed up to take part in the study, of which 20 were finally interviewed, representing four schools (three in the selected municipality and one in a neighbor municipality). Before the interview, informed consent was obtained by informing the students about confidentiality arrangements, their right to withdraw their participation and subsequently asking them about their consent to participate. The consent was recorded and transcribed along with the following interview. Twenty students who had initially signed up were excluded after initial consent due to incorrect phone numbers or if the potential participants were not reachable on the agreed time for participation. The reason for terminating the recruitment after 20 interviewees was based on the fact that little or no new information was considered to occur by including additional participants.

Participants

The final sample consisted of 20 students. Background information of the participants is presented in Table  1 . The group included eleven girls and nine boys between 15 and 19 years of age. Seven participants attended natural sciences/technology/mathematic programs and 13 attended social sciences/humanities programs. Twelve participants lived in the socioeconomically affluent municipality where the schools were located and eight in neighboring municipalities. The sample included three abstainers and 17 informants who were using substances, the latter referring to self-reported present use of alcohol and/or illicit drugs (without further specification). Additionally, 18 of the participants reported that at least one of their parents had a university education.

During April–May 2020, semi-structured telephone interviews with the students were conducted by five of the authors (PK, YD, AKC, TH, CS). The interviewers had continuous contact during the interview process, exchanging their experiences from the interviews and also the content of the interviews. After 20 interviews had been conducted, it was assessed that no or little new information could be obtained by additional interviews and the interview process was terminated. The interviews, on average around 60 min long, were recorded on audio files and transcribed verbatim.

Qualitative content analysis, informed by Hsieh & Shannon [ 52 ] and Granheim & Lundman [ 53 ], was used to analyze the interview material. To increase reliability of the analytic process, a team based approach was employed [ 54 ], utilizing the broad expertise represented in the research team and the direct experience of information collected from the five interviewers.

The software NVivo 12 was utilized for structuring the interview data. Initially, one of the researchers (PK) read all the interviews repeatedly, searching for meaningful units which could be grouped into preliminary categories and codes, as exemplified in Table 2 . During the process, a preliminary coding scheme was developed and presented to the whole research team. After discussion, the coding scheme was slightly revised. Following this procedure, a second coder (CS) applied the updated coding scheme along with definitions (codebook) [ 54 ], coding all the interviews independently. Subsequent discussions between PK, YD and CS, resulted in an additionally revised coding scheme. This scheme was utilized by PK and another researcher (LH), who had not been involved in the interviewing or coding, coding all of the interviews independently. The agreement between the coders PK and LH was high and a few disagreements solved through discussion. No change in the codes was necessary and the research team agreed on the coding scheme as outlined in Fig.  1 .

Final coding scheme

The interview material generated three main categories, six subcategories and 27 codes. The results are presented under headings corresponding to the identified subcategories, since they are directly connected to the aim of the study. Content from the main category “External factors” is initially presented to illustrate the context in which the students form their motivation to use or abstain from using substances, as well as their attitudes towards prevention.

External factors

The external factors found in the interview material concerned wealth, availability of alcohol and other substances, parental norms and peer norms. Informants living in the affluent municipality described an expensive lifestyle with boats, ski trips, summer vacations abroad, and frequent restaurant visits, in contrast to informants from other areas who described a more modest lifestyle. These differences were further accentuated by informants’ descriptions of large villas in the affluent municipality, where students can arrange parties while the parents go to their holiday homes. Some informants further pointed to the fact that people in this municipality easily can afford to buy illicit drugs, increasing the availability.

The reason why they do it [use illicit drugs] in [the affluent municipality] is because the parents go away, which make it easier to have parties and be able to smoke grass at home, and also because they can afford it .

Parents’ alcohol norms seemed to vary between families, but most informants described modest drinking at home, with parents consuming alcohol on certain occasions and sometimes when having dinner. However, several informants described that they as minors/children were offered to taste alcohol from the parents’ glasses. Most of the informants meant that their parents trust them not to drink too much when partying.

They [my parents] have said to me that drinking is not good, but that they understand if I drink, sort of.

Both parents’ and peers’ norms appear to influence substance use among the students, The impression is that there is an alcohol liberal norm in the local society among adults as well as among adolescents.

If you want to have a social life in community X, then it is very difficult … you almost cannot have it if you don’t drink at parties.

Motives for using substances

Confirming that both alcohol and illicit drugs are frequently used among students in the current municipality, a number of motives for substance use were expressed by the participants. The most prominent motive appeared to be a desire to feel a part of the social milieu and to attain or maintain high social status, with fear of being excluded from attractive social activities and parties if abstaining from substance use. The participants indicated that you are expected to drink alcohol to be included in the local community social life, claiming that this applied to the adult population as well. Alcohol consumption and even intoxication are perceived to be the norm in the students’ social life and several of the participants noted that abstainers risk being considered too boring to be invited to parties.

The view is that you cannot have fun without alcohol and therefore, you don’t invite sober people.

There seemed to be a high awareness of one’s own as well as peers’ popularity and social status. Participants evaluated peers as high or low status, fun or boring, claiming that trying to be cool and facilitate contact with others motivates people to use substances. High status students are, according to some participants, frequently invited to parties where alcohol and other substances are easily accessible.

I would say that our group of friends has more status. [… ] You know quite a few [people] and you are invited to quite a lot of parties. You can often evaluate the group of friends, i.e. their status, based on which parties they are invited to. […] Some [groups of friends] only drink alcohol and some even take drugs and drink alcohol.

Some differences in traditions and norms between schools was discerned, with certain schools being especially known for high alcohol consumption and drug use procedures when including new students in the school-community. One of the participants described fairly extensive norm violations, with respect to the law, on these occasions, e.g., strong peer pressure to drink alcohol and use illicit drugs, combined with humiliation of new students, careless driving under the influence of substances with other students in the car, and “punishment” by future exclusion from social events of those who don’t participate at these occasions. On the other hand, already popular, or more senior students, appear to be able to abstain from substance use on occasions without being questioned or risk social exclusion. High self-esteem and a firm approach when occasionally saying no to substances is often respected according to the participants. To avoid peer pressure to use alcohol or illicit drugs, the participants suggested acceptable excuses, such as school duties, bringing your moped or car to the party, having a sports activity or work the day after, or having plans with your parents or extended family during the weekend.

Apart from peer influence, several students expressed hedonistic motives, such as enjoying a nice event or simply to have fun.

If you want a little extra fun, then you take drugs.

Apart from social enhancement motives for using substances, some students reported that relaxing from academic pressure or rewarding oneself after an intense period of studying motivates them to use substances. Almost every participant expressed high academic ambitions. One participant who claimed to be very motivated to study expressed drinking due to stress, as illustrated in the extract below:

You study a lot and you are stressed over school. Then it can be very nice to go out and drink and you can forget everything else for a few hours. […] So it can be a “stress reliever” in that way.

Yet another participant explained that academic failure had previously made her use substances to comfort herself. Coping with mental health problems, such as depression, was also stated as a reason for substance use. Moreover, some participants reported that they use ADHD (Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder) medication to be able to study more intensively.

Motives for abstaining from using substances

A number of motives for totally or temporarily abstain from substance use were put forward by the students, such as a wish to be healthy, keep control and avoid embarrassment, influence of parents, academic pressure, sports ambitions or simply lack of interest. Lack of interest in alcohol and drugs was expressed foremost by those attending natural sciences programs and those who totally abstained from substance use.

I attend the engineering program and I don’t think the interest in alcohol and parties is as present as it might be on social sciences programs.

Fear of health consequences was predominantly related to abstaining from illicit drugs, but also alcohol. Motives for abstaining from alcohol included perceived risk of being addicted, due to relatives having alcohol problems (heredity), and taking medicine, for example ADHD medicine, since combining alcohol and medication was perceived as risky. Some students had observed friends getting “weird” or “laze” after using illicit drugs, which made them hesitant to use such substances themselves. With regard to parental norms, most parents were by the participants reported to be “normal drinkers” themselves and quite relaxed about their teens’ alcohol consumption. This applied to both the parents of older teens and minors. However, many of the participants reported that their parents would be upset and disappointed if they found out that their child used illicit substances, which motivated some of them to abstain. Reasons for abstaining from substance use included academic strivings, sports performance ambitions, driving, or other activities requiring sobriety, which the students referred to as socially acceptable reason to abstain from substance use. Prioritizing studies over partying was explicitly expressed as the primary motive to abstain by some of the participants.

We are a group of five or six who come from other municipalities. […] We don’t party and such things and we may be seen as a bit boring. But we are a little more responsible and we are more motivated to study than the others in the class.

A wish to save money and reluctance to support the illegal drug production were also mentioned as reasons to abstain from substance use, however to a lesser extent.

Universal prevention viewed as attractive or feasible

With regard to substance information interventions, some students wanted detailed information about different substances’ physical and psychological effects. The participants emphasized the importance of credible sources or persons providing the information, mentioning researchers, young medical students and even parents as credible sources of information. Individuals who had experience of substance use were also suggested.

You have to tell the facts in a way that makes us want to listen. With the help of various spokespersons who have been involved in it, for example.

Several students stressed the importance of being able to identify with the person sending the message and suggested influencers as plausible sources. Someone who is difficult to relate to was given as an example of a non-credible, as the following excerpt shows:

They shouldn’t take a heroin addicts who talk about having found Jesus, because I do not think it would touch the children or touch the young. You have to somehow find … someone that can relate to the young people.

As for universal prevention, the students also suggested intensified legal measures for companies and people providing young people with alcohol or drugs.

For example, make it difficult for young people to have access to alcohol [...], allocate more time as a police officer to catch the drug dealers.

Both alcohol and illicit drugs were reported as easily accessible. Students can obtain alcohol via social media platforms, such as Instagram and Snapchat, where “liquor cars” market themselves and offer home delivery. In addition, older siblings or peers and even some parents were, according to the informants, providing minor students with alcohol. The main way to access illicit drugs is via parties where older students offer drugs to younger peers. Access to prescription drugs was also reported.

Several of the participants agreed that parental involvement is constructive for substance use prevention. Many of them reported having supportive and caring parents involved in their lives, but at the same time referring to friends’ parents as being more absent, resulting in extensive partying in large homes without parental control. Some students reported that parents don’t realize to what extent youths are using substances and that the parents should pay even more attention to what their children do.

I think [parents should be] keeping track, good track of the kids […] . Keeping track of what they are doing and ask them how they feel and things, I think that helps.

In line with leisure activities as a reason to abstain from substance use, some participants suggested that social activities other than partying could be a way of preventing substance use, as expressed by one participant when asked about plausible ways to prevent substance use.

Find a sport or friend that you train with […] instead of going to a party,

Talking about their leisure activities, the participants expressed joy and that these activities made them relax while being social.

The leisure interests, like working out and hanging out with friends, is relaxing and in contrast to the everyday in some way .

Universal prevention viewed as inappropriate

Several of the participants expressed great skepticism towards traditional universal preventive strategies, such as lectures by teachers, social workers or researchers. Some teachers were perceived as ignorant and unengaged, lecturing about substances only by duty.

The teachers have been a bit like ‘now we’re going to talk about drugs […] and then you have fifteen minutes and they say something like ‘here we are a drug free and smoke and tobacco free school’, and no one obeys.

Some students also doubted that the information provided from school and society is true, suspecting exaggerated report on harm, and that they prefer information from social media platforms such as Youtube or other online sources.

It feels like the information we get in school is a bit exaggerated, a bit made up for us […] A bit like this, ‘now we’ll get the young people to stop’.

Selective prevention viewed as attractive or feasible

In circumstances where students are worried about their own or peers’ substance use, participants stressed the need for a way to connect with local authority, health care or other support anonymously, without being registered in medical records or being reported to the authorities. Moreover, the participants emphasized the importance of a non-judging approach from professionals when they reach out to students at risk of excessive substance use.

If you wonder about something or if you are worried about something, then you should be able to turn to adults without being yelled at and know that you are getting positive feedback like ‘I understand you’ and ‘how can we fix this?’

Selective prevention viewed as inappropriate

As indicated above, help-seeking seemed to be counteracted by fear of being recorded in medical records or in the criminal registries. One participant mentioned an incident where a student, caught smoking marijuana, was prosecuted and that this student’s life had been severely affected with cancellation of planned studies abroad and rejection of driving license application. These consequences had, according to the participant, resulted in the student “giving up” and selling illicit alcohol to other students instead of trying to strive for a good future life. Admitting that such an incident can serve as a warning to other students, the fear of consequences is, according to the participant, still an obstacle to seeking help.

People don’t really know what to do when they see their friends do it [use substances]. You don’t want to tell on them, because they are afraid that if it is written down somewhere, then everything can be ruined.

Also, parents were by the participants reported as being reluctant to seek help for their children, because of fear of the reporting of their child’s behavior or crime to authorities, with subsequent negative consequences.

Parents do not dare either because they don’t want it to be about their children. I know some parents who have found drugs in their children’s rooms, but do not want to ruin [future prospects] for them.

The current study aimed to explore motives for using or abstaining from using substances, including alcohol, among students in affluent areas, as well as their attitudes to and suggestions for substance use prevention.

Summary of results

The motives for using substances among the students are associated with social aspects as.

well as own pleasure and coping with stressful situations. The most prominent motive appears to be a desire to feel a part of the current social milieu and to attain or maintain high social status within the peer group. Several of the students expressed fear of being excluded from attractive social activities if abstaining from substance use, although some meant that they were not interested in substances and didn’t care if they were perceived as boring, and also had found a small group of friends with whom they socialized. Motives for abstaining, apart from lack of interest, included academic ambitions, activities requiring sobriety, parental influence, and a wish to stay healthy. The students expressed negative attitudes towards current information-based prevention as well as problems with using selective prevention interventions due to fear of being registered or reported to the authorities. Students’ suggestions for feasible universal prevention concerned reliable information from credible sources, stricter substance control measures, extended parental involvement, and social leisure activities without substance use. Suggestions regarding selective prevention were guaranteed confidentiality and non-judging encounters when seeking help due to substance use problems.

Comparison with previous research

Children of affluence are generally presumed to be at low risk for negative health outcomes. However, the current study, in accordance with other recent studies [ 29 , 55 ], suggest problems in several domains including alcohol and drug use and stress related problems, even if the cause of these problems cannot be determined based on our interview study. Previous explanations for extensive substance use among affluent young people have been exceptionally high-performance requirements in both school and in leisure activities, and absence of emotional and physical adult contact, resulting from parents in affluent areas spending a lot of time on their jobs and careers [ 30 , 56 , 57 , 58 ]. These explanations can be viewed in the light of Cooper and colleagues’ [ 21 ] as well as Boys and colleagues’ [ 23 , 24 , 25 ] previously identified coping motive for substance use. Coping appears among affluent young people as a central motive for substance use, i.e., coping with performance requirements and perhaps with negative affects due to parents’ absence. In the current study, however, social motives, including conformity, i.e., using substances due to social pressure and a need to fit in [ 21 , 23 , 24 , 25 ] appears to be the most prominent motive, supporting the social learning theory which proposes that behavior can be acquired by observing and imitating others and by rewards connected to the behavior [ 16 , 59 ]. Interestingly, a small group of participants, especially from natural sciences programs, resisted the general pressure to use substances and found a social context of a few friends with whom they socialized without striving for high social status in the larger social context. The wish to be included in the social life and achieve high social status within the peer group was described as a central motive for substance use among a majority of the students, along with fear of being excluded if abstaining. Previous research show that high socioeconomic status is a protective factor for substance use disorder among adults [ 60 ], but among young people it may be the opposite. High status appears to be an important risk factor for the use of substances, at least among those striving for higher status. The students report that they, to achieve high status, must attend parties and at least drink alcohol. After achieving high status, which has resulted in frequent invitations to parties, students then may pose an even higher risk of excessive alcohol and drug use. In line with previous studies, results show that individuals with larger social networks, which has shown to be an indicator for social status among young, also drink more [ 35 , 61 ]. However, status can also act as a protective factor. Individuals with higher status have, according to the interviewees, slightly more room for maneuver to temporarily say no to substances at a party, without being pressured or ashamed. Nevertheless, several of the interviewees reported that they have to choose between using substances or being excluded from desirable social activities, as abstainers are considered “boring”. The results further show that alcohol and other drugs are popular among affluent youth and the information from the participants indicate that the students perceive substance use to be under control. One possible explanation is that high affluence can contribute to a sense of control over one’s life [ 62 ]. Although previous studies show that young people from affluent areas drink more, the risk of developing alcohol problems is still greater among young people who grow up in more disadvantaged areas [ 57 ]. Why this is the case is unclear. There is a widespread belief that affluent youngsters have plenty of social and financial resources in the family and thus receive the right help (e.g., psychotherapy) when they have problems [ 62 ], which could explain why they do not develop alcohol problems. However, research also shows that parents in affluent areas seek less help than others when their children are troubled [ 30 , 63 ], partly due to difficulties in accepting and revealing problems within the family [ 62 ]. In the current study, the informants expressed doubts about the possibility to be guaranteed confidentiality when seeking help, which may mean that there are concerns among both children and parents about the risk of losing status and a good reputation if seeking help for substance use problems. Consequently, there is a risk that any substance use problems will not be noticed in this group [ 62 ].

Previous research indicates that academic pressure may promote substance use [ 56 , 64 ]. However, in the current study academic pressure, due to high ambitions, was reported both as a reason for using substances and abstaining, the former to cope with stress or relax, the latter to maintain a sharp intellect and receive high grades. Moreover, previous research has demonstrated an association between pressure from extracurricular activities or “over scheduling” and negative outcomes among affluent students ( 39 ). In the current study, this did not stand out as a critical vulnerability factor. Instead, students reported extracurricular and leisure activities as relaxing and fun and an accepted reason to abstain from substance use while still attending activities where peers were using substances.

With regard to adult or parental contact, previous research shows that mental health and substance use among adolescents in socioeconomic affluent areas are associated with parents’ lack of reaction to teenage substance use (i.e. liberal, allowing attitudes and minor or no repercussions on discovering use) and parents’ lack of knowledge of their teens’ activities [ 30 ]. In our study, the students reported that their parents do not generally react with punishment due to their child’s alcohol consumption. However, the participants thought that parents probably should react more condemningly due to illicit drug use, if revealed. The Swedish criminalization of illicit substance use [ 46 ] may influence parents to adopt stricter norms with regard to their children’s illicit substance, because of the consequences for revealed substance use that may occur in the Swedish context. Also, parents in the current study were reported as being reluctant to seek help for their children out of fear of negative consequences that may affect their children. This result is in line with previous research, showing that concern about admitting problems in their children is elevated among affluent parents [ 30 ], mentioned above. In the current study, the participants further reported closeness to their parents and that their parents cared about how they spent their time. That said, some parents of wealthy peers were reported as being more absent, resulting in extensive partying in large homes without parental control. Previous research has shown the nature of family relationships and perceptions of closeness to be important protective factors for adolescent mental health [ 56 ], and this seems to apply to the students in the current study.

The students’ attitudes to current substance use prevention, aimed to increase students’ knowledge, are to a large extent negative. Information provided in school were reported as exaggerated and uninteresting. Instead, students suggested interventions focusing on credible sources of reliable information, such as from people with personal adverse experiences of substance use and people whom they can identify with. Whether people with own experience of substance use are credible or helpful in a more objective way can be disputed, but the students seem to put their trust in them rather than other persons. This result is partly in line with previous research on school-based programs in general, suggesting that the role of the teacher (the one who deliver the information) is central and that the use of peer leaders can be successful in engaging the students who receive the message [ 65 , 66 ]. Some informants in the current study meant that the teachers in school were ignorant and unengaged, lecturing about substances only by duty, which of course can be problematic for the sense of credibility among those receiving the information. Previous research has demonstrated that for older adolescents, a social influence approach can increase the effectiveness of alcohol and drug prevention interventions, as can health education, basic skills training and the inclusion of parental support [ 67 ]. Again, this research applies to adolescents in general and not to affluent youth specifically.

Interestingly, the students also suggested stricter regulations on substances with intensified legal measures for those providing substances. Positive attitudes to limiting access of alcohol for drunk people have previously been shown in a Spanish study among adolescents participating in an open-air gatherings of binge drinkers [ 19 ]. The positive attitude to stricter regulations for those providing substances is interesting in the light of the students’ desire for a non-judging approach when having to seek help for own substance use, as described below. Previous research, however, supports strict policy measures to decrease availability as an effective measure for substance use prevention in the general population [ 68 ]. The students further suggested increased parental control and activities and venues which can be attended without using substances, for example sporting/training with friends. Leisure activities without substance use have recently been offered to e.g., adolescents in general in an Icelandic prevention strategy [ 69 ], however more research is needed to see if this kind of prevention is attractive also for large groups of affluent students as an alternative to parties and whether it also appears to be effective in reducing substance use in this group. Clearly, some affluent students without ambitions to receive high social status do find socialization without using substances attractive, as shown in the current study. With regard to selective prevention, the students were critical of the current risk of being reported to parents, registered within medical records or reported to the authorities if turning to professionals for support for substance use problems. They claimed that this circumstance serves as a massive counteracting force to seek help at an early stage for oneself or for peers and that the possibility of reaching out anonymously is essential for taking the first step in seeking help. Moreover, the adolescents in this study call for an open and non-judging approach when turning to health care staff, parents or other adults, which is in line with so called Motivational Interviewing, a non-judging approach aimed to enhance motivation to change by exploring and resolving ambivalence about e.g., substance-related behaviors [ 70 ], which has shown promising results with regard to reduction of alcohol consumption among young people [ 71 ].

Strengths and limitations

The current study has a number of strengths. Firstly, we were able to recruit both male and female students between 15 and 19 years of age, living inside the affluent community as well as in neighboring municipalities, which provided us with a broad base of the students’ social context. Secondly, we included informants using substances as well as abstainers, increasing the possibility to get a broad view of motives to use or abstain from using substances among affluent youth. Thirdly, the research group has extensive experience in qualitative analysis as well as working with adolescents and young adults with mental health problems, including alcohol and drug consumption or abuse. However, our study must also be viewed in the context of some limitations. Students with more severe health or psychosocial problems may have refrained from participating, biasing the results towards adolescents of more stable psychosocial functioning. Moreover, interview studies are always vulnerable for social desirability bias due to a potential desire to give socially acceptable answers [ 72 ]. However, the possibility to terminate participation at any time, along with the circumstance that most of the interviewers are health care professionals, thereby used to handle secrecy in consultation situations, may have decreased the risk of desirability bias in the current study.

Several of the motives guiding substance use behavior among young people in general also seem to apply to affluent youth. A desire to feel a part of the current social milieu and to attain or maintain high social status within the peer group were reported as prominent motives for substance use among affluent students in the current study. Given that the social milieu is crucial for the substance use behavior in this context, future research on substance use prevention targeting this group could with advantage pay attention to suggestions on prevention strategies given by the students. Students’ suggestions include reliable prevention information from credible sources, stricter substance control measures targeting those providing substances, parental involvement, leisure activities without substance use, and confidential ways to seek help, involving a non-judging approach from professionals and other adults.

Availability of data and materials

Collected data will be available from the Centre for Psychiatry Research, a collaboration between Karolinska Institutet and Region Stockholm, but restrictions apply to their availability, as they were used under ethical permission for the current study, and so are not publicly available. However, data are available from the authors upon reasonable request and with permission from the Centre for Psychiatry Research.

Abbreviations

attention deficit hyperactivity disorder

natural sciences/technology/mathematic programs

social sciences/humanities programs

Stockholm prevents alcohol and drug problems

The ESPAD Group. ESPAD report. Results from the European school survey project on alcohol and other drugs. Luxembourg: European Monitoring Centre for Drugs and Drug Addiction; 2019. p. 2020.

Google Scholar  

World Health Organization. Global status report on alcohol and health. WHO. 2018:2018.

Arria AM, Caldeira KM, Bugbee BA, Vincent KB, O'Grady KE. Marijuana use trajectories during college predict health outcomes nine years post-matriculation. Drug Alcohol Depend. 2016;159:158–65. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.drugalcdep.2015.12.009 .

Article   PubMed   Google Scholar  

Burdzovic Andreas J, Lauritzen G, Nordfjærn T. Co-occurrence between mental distress and poly-drug use: a ten year prospective study of patients from substance abuse treatment. Addict Behav. 2015;48:71–8. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.addbeh.2015.05.001 .

McGovern R, Kaner E, McArdle P, Ramesh V, Stewart S. Impact of alcohol consumption on young people: a systematic review of published reviews. Newcastle: Newcastle University; 2009.

Volkow ND, Baler RD, Compton WM, Weiss SRB. Adverse health effects of marijuana use. N Engl J Med. 2014;370(23):2219–27. https://doi.org/10.1056/NEJMra1402309 .

Article   CAS   PubMed   PubMed Central   Google Scholar  

Lees B, Mewton L, Stapinski LA, Squeglia LM, Rae CD, Teesson M. Neurobiological and cognitive profile of young binge drinkers: a systematic review and Meta-analysis. Neuropsychol Rev. 2019;29(3):357–85. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11065-019-09411-w .

Article   PubMed   PubMed Central   Google Scholar  

White V, Azar D, Faulkner A, Coomber K, Durkin S, Livingston M, et al. Adolescents’ alcohol use and strength of policy relating to youth access, trading hours and driving under the influence: findings from Australia. Addiction. 2018;113(6):1030–42. https://doi.org/10.1111/add.14164 .

Hicks RD, Bemis Batzer G, Bemis Batzer W, Imai WK. Psychiatric, developmental, and adolescent medicine issues in adolescent substance use and abuse. Adolesc Med. 1993;4(2):453–68.

CAS   PubMed   Google Scholar  

Flory K, Lynam D, Milich R, Leukefeld C, Clayton R. Early adolescent through young adult alcohol and marijuana use trajectories: early predictors, young adult outcomes, and predictive utility. Dev Psychopathol. 2004;16(1):193–213. https://doi.org/10.1017/s0954579404044475 .

Coie JD, Watt NF, West SG, Hawkins JD, Asarnow JR, Markman HJ, et al. The science of prevention. A conceptual framework and some directions for a national research program. Am Psychol. 1993;48(10):1013–22. https://doi.org/10.1037/0003-066X.48.10.1013 .

Article   CAS   PubMed   Google Scholar  

Murray E. Web-Based Interventions for Behavior Change and Self-Management: Potential, Pitfalls, and Progress. Med 20. 2012;1(2):e3.

Newton NC, Conrod PJ, Slade T, Carragher N, Champion KE, Barrett EL, et al. The long-term effectiveness of a selective, personality-targeted prevention program in reducing alcohol use and related harms: a cluster randomized controlled trial. J Child Psychol Psychiatry. 2016;57(9):1056–65. https://doi.org/10.1111/jcpp.12558 .

Kvillemo P, Strandberg AK, Gripenberg J, Berman AH, Skoglund C, Elgán TH. Effects of an automated digital brief prevention intervention targeting adolescents and young adults with risky alcohol and other substance use: study protocol for a randomised controlled trial. BMJ Open. 2020;10(5):e034894. https://doi.org/10.1136/bmjopen-2019-034894 .

Champion KE, Newton NC, Teesson M. Prevention of alcohol and other drug use and related harm in the digital age: what does the evidence tell us? Current opinion in psychiatry. 2016;29(4):242–9. https://doi.org/10.1097/YCO.0000000000000258 .

Bandura A. Self-efficacy: toward a unifying theory of behavioral change. Adv Behav Res Ther. 1978;1(4):139–61. https://doi.org/10.1016/0146-6402(78)90002-4 .

Article   Google Scholar  

Gerstein DR, Green LW. Preventing Drug Abuse: What do we know? Washington (DC): National Academies Press (US). Copyright 1993 by the National Academy of Sciences. All rights reserved.; 1993.

Ajzen I. Attitudes, personality, and behavior: McGraw-hill education (UK); 2005.

Gervilla E, Quigg Z, Duch M, Juan M, Guimarães C. Adolescents’ Alcohol Use in Botellon and Attitudes towards Alcohol Use and Prevention Policies. Int J Environ Res Public Health. 2020;17(11).

DiBello AM, Miller MB, Neighbors C, Reid A, Carey KB. The relative strength of attitudes versus perceived drinking norms as predictors of alcohol use. Addict Behav. 2018;80:39–46. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.addbeh.2017.12.022 .

Cooper ML. Motivations for alcohol use among adolescents: development and validation of a four-factor model. Psychol Assess. 1994;6(2):117–28. https://doi.org/10.1037/1040-3590.6.2.117 .

Kettner H, Mason NL, Kuypers KPC. Motives for classical and novel psychoactive substances use in psychedelic Polydrug users. Contemporary Drug Problems. 2019;46(3):304–20. https://doi.org/10.1177/0091450919863899 .

Boys A, Marsden J, Fountain J, Griffiths P, Stillwell G, Strang J. What influences young people's use of drugs? A qualitative study of decision-making. Drugs: education, prevention and policy. 1999;6(3):373–87.

Boys A, Marsden J, Strang J. Understanding reasons for drug use amongst young people: a functional perspective. Health Educ Res. 2001;16(4):457–69. https://doi.org/10.1093/her/16.4.457 .

Boys A, Marsden J. Perceived functions predict intensity of use and problems in young polysubstance users. Addiction. 2003;98(7):951–63. https://doi.org/10.1046/j.1360-0443.2003.00394.x .

Swift W, Coffey C, Carlin JB, Degenhardt L, Patton GC. Adolescent cannabis users at 24 years: trajectories to regular weekly use and dependence in young adulthood. Addiction. 2008;103(8):1361–70. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1360-0443.2008.02246.x .

Von Sydow K, Lieb R, Pfister H, Hofler M, H. U W. What predicts incident use of cannabis and progression to abuse and dependence? A 4-year prospective examination of risk factors in a community sample of adolescents and young adults. Drug and Alcohol Dependence. 2002;68:49–64.

Probst C, Kilian C, Sanchez S, Lange S, Rehm J. The role of alcohol use and drinking patterns in socioeconomic inequalities in mortality: a systematic review. Lancet Public Health. 2020;5(6):e324–e32. https://doi.org/10.1016/S2468-2667(20)30052-9 .

Luthar SS, Small PJ, Ciciolla L. Adolescents from upper middle class communities: substance misuse and addiction across early adulthood. Dev Psychopathol. 2018;30(1):315–35. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0954579417000645 .

Levine M. The Price of privilege: how parental pressure and material advantage are creating a generation of disconnected and unhappy kids. New York: Harper; 2008.

Martin CC. High socioeconomic status predicts substance use and alcohol consumption in U.S. undergraduates. Substance Use & Misuse. 2019;54(6):1035–43. https://doi.org/10.1080/10826084.2018.1559193 .

Patrick ME, Wightman P, Schoeni RF, Schulenberg JE. Socioeconomic status and substance use among young adults: a comparison across constructs and drugs. J Stud Alcohol Drugs. 2012;73(5):772–82. https://doi.org/10.15288/jsad.2012.73.772 .

Janicijevic KM, Kocic SS, Radevic SR, Jovanovic MR, Radovanovic SM. Socioeconomic Factors Associated with Psychoactive Substance Abuse by Adolescents in Serbia. Frontiers in Pharmacology. 2017;8:366.

Charitonidi E, Studer J, Gaume J, Gmel G, Daeppen J-B, Bertholet N. Socioeconomic status and substance use among Swiss young men: a population-based cross-sectional study. BMC Public Health. 2016;16(1):333. https://doi.org/10.1186/s12889-016-2949-5 .

Hiltunen L. Lagom perfekt. Erfarenheter av ohälsa bland unga tjejer och killar the pursuit of restrained perfection: experiences of ill health among adolescent girls and boys (in Swedish). Växjö: Linnéuniversitetet; 2017.

Låftman SB, Almquist Ylva B, Östberg. Viveca Students’ Accounts of School-performance Stress: A Qualitative Analysis of a High-achieving Setting in Stockholm, Sweden. Journal of Youth Studies. 2013;Vol. 16(nr 7):932–49.

Luthar SS, Becker BE. Privileged but pressured? A study of affluent youth. Child Dev. 2002;73(5):1593–610. https://doi.org/10.1111/1467-8624.00492 .

Moore R, Ames G, Cunradi C. Physical and social availability of alcohol for young enlisted naval personnel in and around home port. Substance abuse treatment, prevention, and policy. 2007;2:17.

Luthar SS, Barkin SH. Are affluent youth truly “at risk”? Vulnerability and resilience across three diverse samples. Dev Psychopathol. 2012;24(2):429–49. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0954579412000089 .

Levy S, Campbell MD, Shea CL, DuPont R. Trends in abstaining from substance use in adolescents: 1975–2014. Pediatrics. 2018;142(2):e20173498. https://doi.org/10.1542/peds.2017-3498 .

CAN. Drogutvecklingen i Sverige 2019 (The Drug development in Sweden (In Swedish). 2019.

County Administrative Board of Stockholm. Stockholmsenkäten 2020 (The Stockholm survey 2020) (In Swedish) Stockholm2020 [Available from: https://www.lansstyrelsen.se/download/18.2887c5dd16488fe880d49c70/1536754022929/Stockholmsenk%C3%A4ten%202018%20-%20Droger%20och%20spel%20gymn%20%C3%A5k%202.pdf .

CAN. Jämlika vanor? – Skolans socioekonomiska sammansättning och skillnader i användning av alkohol, narkotika och tobak i årskurs 9 (Equal habits – Schools socioeconomic profile and differences in use of alcohol, narcitics and tobacco in year nine in secondary school) (In Swedish). Stockholm: CAN; 2020.

Demant J, Schierff LM. Five typologies of alcohol and drug prevention programmes. A qualitative review of the content of alcohol and drug prevention programmes targeting adolescents. Drugs: Education, Prevention and Policy. 2019;26(1):32–9.

Alcohol Act [Alkohollag] (SFS 2010:1622).

Penal Law on Narcotics [Narkotikastrafflag] (SFS 1968:64).

Kristjansson AL, James JE, Allegrante JP, Sigfusdottir ID, Helgason AR. Adolescent substance use, parental monitoring, and leisure-time activities: 12-year outcomes of primary prevention in Iceland. Prev Med. 2010;51(2):168–71. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ypmed.2010.05.001 .

Stockings E, Hall WD, Lynskey M, Morley KI, Reavley N, Strang J, et al. Prevention, early intervention, harm reduction, and treatment of substance use in young people. Lancet Psychiatry. 2016;3(3):280–96. https://doi.org/10.1016/S2215-0366(16)00002-X .

Ajzen I, Fishbein M. The prediction of behavior from attitudinal and normative variables. J Exp Soc Psychol. 1970;6(4):466–87. https://doi.org/10.1016/0022-1031(70)90057-0 .

Wallace DS, Paulson RM, Lord CG, Bond CF. Which behaviors do attitudes predict? Meta-analyzing the effects of social pressure and perceived difficulty. Rev Gen Psychol. 2005;9(3):214–27. https://doi.org/10.1037/1089-2680.9.3.214 .

Statistics Sweden. Utbildning, jobb och dina pengar (Education, job and your money) (In Swedish) 2020 [Available from: https://www.scb.se/hitta-statistik/sverige-i-siffror/utbildning-jobb-och-pengar/ .

Hsieh HF, Shannon SE. Three approaches to qualitative content analysis. Qual Health Res. 2005;15(9):1277–88. https://doi.org/10.1177/1049732305276687 .

Graneheim U, Lundman B. Qualitative content analysis in nursing research: concepts, procedures and measures to achieve trustworthiness. Nurse Educ Today. 2004;24(2):105–12. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.nedt.2003.10.001 .

MacQueen KM, McLellan E, Kay K, Milstein B. Codebook development for team-based qualitative analysis. CAM Journal. 1998;10(2):31–6. https://doi.org/10.1177/1525822X980100020301 .

Luthar SS, Kumar NL, Zillmer N. High-achieving schools connote risks for adolescents: problems documented, processes implicated, and directions for interventions. Am Psychol. 2019;75(7):983–95. https://doi.org/10.1037/amp0000556 .

Luthar SS. The culture of affluence: psychological costs of material wealth. Child Dev. 2003;74(6):1581–93. https://doi.org/10.1046/j.1467-8624.2003.00625.x .

Pedersen W, Bakken A, von Soest T. Adolescents from affluent city districts drink more alcohol than others. Addiction. 2015;110(10):1595–604. https://doi.org/10.1111/add.13005 .

Komro KA, Maldonado-Molina MM, Tobler AL, Bonds JR, Muller KE. Effects of home access and availability of alcohol on young adolescents' alcohol use. Addiction. 2007;102(10):1597–608. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1360-0443.2007.01941.x .

Akers RL, Krohn MD, Lanza-Kaduce L, Radosevich M. Social learning and deviant behavior: A specific test of a general theory. Contemporary Masters in Criminology: Springer; 1995. p. 187–214, Social Learning and Deviant Behavior: A Specific Test of a General Theory, DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4757-9829-6_12 .

Deeken F, Banaschewski T, Kluge U, Rapp MA. Risk and protective factors for alcohol use disorders across the lifespan. Current Addiction Reports. 2020;7(3):245–51. https://doi.org/10.1007/s40429-020-00313-z .

Neighbors C, Krieger H, Rodriguez LM, Rinker DV, Lembo JM. Social identity and drinking: dissecting social networks and implications for novel interventions. Journal of Prevention & Intervention in the Community. 2019;47(3):259–73. https://doi.org/10.1080/10852352.2019.1603676 .

Luthar SS, Sexton CC. The high price of affluence. In: Kail RV, editor. Advances in Child Development and Behavior. 32: JAI; 2004. p. 125–162.

Puura K, Almqvist F, Tamminen T, Piha J, Kumpulainen K, Räsänen E, et al. Children with symptoms of depression--what do the adults see? Journal of child psychology and psychiatry, and allied disciplines. 1998;39(4):577–85. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0021963098002418 .

Leonard NR, Gwadz MV, Ritchie A, Linick JL, Cleland CM, Elliott L, et al. A multi-method exploratory study of stress, coping, and substance use among high school youth in private schools. Front Psychol. 2015;6:1028.

McBride N, Farringdon F, Midford R, Meuleners L, Phillips M. Harm minimization in school drug education: final results of the school health and alcohol harm reduction project (SHAHRP). Addiction. 2004;99(3):278–91. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1360-0443.2003.00620.x .

Midford R, Munro G, McBride N, Snow P, Ladzinski U. Principles that underpin effective school-based drug education. J Drug Educ. 2002;32(4):363–86. https://doi.org/10.2190/T66J-YDBX-J256-J8T9 .

Mewton L, Visontay R, Chapman C, Newton N, Slade T, Kay-Lambkin F, et al. Universal prevention of alcohol and drug use: an overview of reviews in an Australian context. Drug Alcohol Rev. 2018;37(Suppl 1):S435–s69. https://doi.org/10.1111/dar.12694 .

Toumbourou JW, Stockwell T, Neighbors C, Marlatt GA, Sturge J, Rehm J. Interventions to reduce harm associated with adolescent substance use. Lancet. 2007;369(9570):1391–401. https://doi.org/10.1016/S0140-6736(07)60369-9 .

Kristjansson AL, Sigfusdottir ID, Thorlindsson T, Mann MJ, Sigfusson J, Allegrante JP. Population trends in smoking, alcohol use and primary prevention variables among adolescents in Iceland, 1997–2014. Addiction. 2016;111(4):645–52. https://doi.org/10.1111/add.13248 .

Miller WR, Rollnick S. Motivational interviewing: helping people change. 3rd ed. New York: The Guilford Press; 2013.

Kohler S, Hofmann A. Can motivational interviewing in emergency care reduce alcohol consumption in young people? A systematic review and meta-analysis. Alcohol and alcoholism (Oxford, Oxfordshire). 2015;50(2):107–17.

Article   CAS   Google Scholar  

Edwards A. The social desirability variable in personality assessment and research. New York: The Dryden Press; 1957.

Download references

Acknowledgements

We would like to thank all the participating students for making this study possible.

The work was funded by the Alcohol Research Council of the Swedish Alcohol Retailing Monopoly (grant no. 2018–0010). The funding body had no role in study design, data collection, analysis, data interpretation or writing the manuscript. Open Access funding provided by Karolinska Institute.

Author information

Authors and affiliations.

STAD, Centre for Psychiatry Research, Department of Clinical Neuroscience, Karolinska Institutet, & Stockholm Health Care Services, Region Stockholm, Norra Stationsgatan 69, SE-113 64, Stockholm, Sweden

Pia Kvillemo, Johanna Gripenberg, Tobias H. Elgán & Charlotte Skoglund

Department of Social Studies, Linnaeus university, Växjö, Sweden

Linda Hiltunen

Centre for Psychiatry Research, Department of Clinical Neuroscience, Karolinska Institutet & Stockholm Health Care Services, Region Stockholm, Liljeholmstorget 7, 117 63, Stockholm, Sweden

Youstina Demetry

Department of Neuroscience, Uppsala University, Uppsala, Sweden

Anna-Karin Carlander, Kim Einhorn & Charlotte Skoglund

Psychiatry North West, Region Stockholm, Sollentunavägen 84, SE-191 22, Sollentuna, Sweden

Tim Hansson

You can also search for this author in PubMed   Google Scholar

Contributions

PK contributed to conceptualization, methodology, investigation (data collection), data curation, formal analysis, writing original draft, review & editing, funding acquisition. LH contributed to conceptualization, methodology, data curation, formal analysis, validation, review & editing. YD contributed to project administration, methodology, investigation (data collection), data curation, formal analysis, validation, review & editing. AC contributed to investigation (data collection), review & editing. TH contributed to investigation (data collection), review & editing. JG contributed to conceptualization, methodology, review & editing, funding acquisition. TE contributed to conceptualization, methodology, review & editing. KE contributed to review & editing. CS contributed to conceptualization, methodology, investigation (data collection), data curation, formal analysis, review & editing, funding acquisition, supervision. All authors approved the submitted manuscript version.

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Pia Kvillemo .

Ethics declarations

Ethics approval and consent to participate.

The study was performed in accordance with the Declaration of Helsinki and was approved by the Swedish Ethical Review Authority (dnr. 2019–02646).

Consent for publication

Not applicable.

Competing interests

The authors declare that they have no competing interests.

Additional information

Publisher’s note.

Springer Nature remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations.

Supplementary Information

Additional file 1., rights and permissions.

Open Access This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article's Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article's Creative Commons licence and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this licence, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ . The Creative Commons Public Domain Dedication waiver ( http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/ ) applies to the data made available in this article, unless otherwise stated in a credit line to the data.

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Cite this article.

Kvillemo, P., Hiltunen, L., Demetry, Y. et al. How to prevent alcohol and illicit drug use among students in affluent areas: a qualitative study on motivation and attitudes towards prevention. Subst Abuse Treat Prev Policy 16 , 83 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1186/s13011-021-00420-8

Download citation

Accepted : 19 October 2021

Published : 07 November 2021

DOI : https://doi.org/10.1186/s13011-021-00420-8

Share this article

Anyone you share the following link with will be able to read this content:

Sorry, a shareable link is not currently available for this article.

Provided by the Springer Nature SharedIt content-sharing initiative

• Intervention

Substance Abuse Treatment, Prevention, and Policy

ISSN: 1747-597X

• General enquiries: [email protected]

Essay on Drug Addiction Among Youth

Students are often asked to write an essay on Drug Addiction Among Youth in their schools and colleges. And if you’re also looking for the same, we have created 100-word, 250-word, and 500-word essays on the topic.

Let’s take a look…

100 Words Essay on Drug Addiction Among Youth

Understanding drug addiction.

Drug addiction is a serious issue among youth. It refers to the compulsive use of drugs, leading to harmful consequences.

Causes of Drug Addiction

Several factors contribute to drug addiction in youth. Peer pressure, stress, and curiosity are some common reasons.

Effects of Drug Addiction

Drug addiction can lead to physical and mental health problems. It also affects academic performance and social relationships.

Preventing Drug Addiction

Awareness and education are key to preventing drug addiction. Schools should provide information about the dangers of drug use.

250 Words Essay on Drug Addiction Among Youth

The escalating issue of drug addiction among youth.

Drug addiction among youth is an alarming issue that has been escalating globally. The vulnerability of the younger demographic to substance abuse is a result of various factors, including peer pressure, stress, and the quest for self-discovery.

Factors Fueling Drug Addiction

Peer pressure is a significant contributor to drug abuse among youth. Young individuals, in their quest to fit in, often succumb to the pressure of trying drugs. Moreover, stress, whether academic or personal, pushes some into the abyss of drug addiction as a coping mechanism.

The Detrimental Effects of Drug Addiction

The consequences of drug addiction are far-reaching. Physically, it can lead to severe health issues such as heart diseases, liver damage, and even death. Psychologically, it can cause mental disorders like depression and anxiety. Socially, it can lead to isolation, negatively affecting academic performance and future career prospects.

Prevention and Treatment

Preventing drug addiction among youth requires a multifaceted approach. Schools and colleges need to incorporate drug education in their curriculum to raise awareness about the dangers of drug use. Parents and caregivers should maintain open lines of communication with their children about the risks involved with drug abuse.

For those already in the grip of addiction, treatment options include therapy, counseling, and rehabilitation programs. These treatments aim to help individuals overcome their addiction and reintegrate into society as productive members.

500 Words Essay on Drug Addiction Among Youth

Introduction.

Drug addiction among youth is a pressing issue that has been plaguing societies around the globe. It is an intricate problem that stems from a myriad of causes and has severe consequences, not only for the individual but also for the society at large.

Causes of Drug Addiction Among Youth

Several factors contribute to drug addiction among youth. Peer pressure is a significant contributor, as young people often succumb to the urge of fitting in, even if it means experimenting with drugs. The transition phase from adolescence to adulthood is fraught with challenges and insecurities, making youth vulnerable to drug use as a form of escapism.

The effects of drug addiction are multifaceted and devastating. Physically, it can lead to a weakened immune system, organ damage, and in some cases, fatal overdose. Psychologically, it can result in impaired judgment, memory loss, and mental health disorders.

The repercussions extend beyond the individual to affect their families and communities. It can lead to strained relationships, financial difficulties, and even crime. On a societal level, addiction can burden healthcare systems and increase crime rates, thereby affecting overall social stability and progress.

Prevention and Intervention Strategies

Secondly, mental health support should be more accessible to youth. By addressing the root causes of drug use, like mental health disorders, we can significantly reduce the likelihood of addiction.

Lastly, communities and families need to foster an environment where youth feel safe to discuss their struggles. Open dialogue can help identify early signs of drug use and provide necessary support to those in need.

Drug addiction among youth is a complex issue that requires collective effort and understanding. By addressing the root causes and implementing effective prevention strategies, we can hope to curb this growing problem. It is crucial for society to remember that addiction is not a moral failing but a health issue that requires compassion, support, and appropriate intervention.

If you’re looking for more, here are essays on other interesting topics:

Apart from these, you can look at all the essays by clicking here .

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Save my name, email, and website in this browser for the next time I comment.

ESSAY SAUCE

FOR STUDENTS : ALL THE INGREDIENTS OF A GOOD ESSAY

Essay: Impact of Alcohol, Tobacco And Drug Abuse on Youth

Essay details and download:.

• Subject area(s): Sociology essays
• Reading time: 10 minutes
• Price: Free download
• Published: 16 June 2012*
• File format: Text
• Words: 2,839 (approx)
• Number of pages: 12 (approx)
• Tags: Drugs essays

Text preview of this essay:

This page of the essay has 2,839 words. Download the full version above.

Impact of Alcohol, Tobacco And Drug Abuse on Youth

Alcohol, tobacco and other drugs are affect youth negatively. Youth especially student’s e.g. secondary and tertiary students abuse alcohol, tobacco and other Drugs. Drugs such as tobacco, cocaine and marijuana are the major drugs which students abuse or use. Youth may end up drinking alcohol and using drugs because of various situations or reasons e.g. youth especially school going drink alcohol, use tobacco and other drug as a result of peer pressure because they may want to feel grown up among their peers, some youth use drugs to relieve boredom and give themselves personal excitement, some use drugs to rebel and get violent without any fear of people or authority, some use drugs to experiment, some use drugs and drink alcohol because their parents also drink alcohol so they end up indulging in the practise as well, social background may also influence youths to use drugs and to drink alcohol e.g. if they are many drug dealers and bottle stores around its easier for youths to indulge in the use of this drugs and lastly some youth may drink alcohol and abuse drugs to feel pleasure and escape the pressures of life or to alter their view of reality. Youth who get into drugs may get it from a friend’s friend, who also got it from his friend’s friend and so on this is to say that drugs are not of easy access because they are illegal. At the end of this long line of friends is a dealer who is making money out of destroying young people futures. The use of alcohol, tobacco and other drugs has negative impacts amongst the students who abuse this substances e.g. excessive alcohol consumption and the abuse of drugs are dangerous because alcohol and drug abuse can affect health and ability to function and think properly, almost every system in the body can be negatively affected by use of drugs and drinking of alcohol. Alcohol can cause cancer, liver disease, heart attacks and brain damage, to mention a few. Alcohol, tobacco and other drug use does not only affect youth especially students’ health wise it also affects their academic performance, it also affect them financially, psychologically, physically and ultimately students may suffer some legal consequences. Youth more so teens, who engage in sexual intercourse and drug abuse including abuse of alcohol and tobacco, are more likely than youth who abstain from such activities to become depressed, have suicidal thoughts and or even attempt suicide.

HEALTH EFFECTS OF ALCOHOL, TOBACCO AND DIFFERENT DRUG USE The use of alcohol, tobacco and other drugs has detrimental effects on health of the youth which may turn out to be fatal. The type of drugs which students commonly use are Stimulants (drugs that produce alertness, high energy, more awake and confident e.g. cocaine, amphetamines, caffeine) and Hallucinogens (give strange and intense visions called hallucinations) ALCOHOL

The scientific name for alcohol that people drink is ethyl alcohol or ethanol. Beer, wine, and liquor all contain ethyl alcohol. Other types of alcohol, like rubbing alcohol are poisonous if ingested. . Excess alcohol is the most common cause of preventable death. Alcohol is highly toxic to almost every organ in the body but when alcohol is taken in allowed limits amounts it is detoxified by the liver and therefore does little or no harm to the body. Alcoholic drinks contain ethyl alcohol and it is metabolized in the body to acetaldehyde. Both ethanol and acetaldehyde interfere with normal functioning of organs in the body including the heart and the liver and therefore if the liver and the heart get damaged disease occur which may eventually kill, teenagers maybe more prone to this effects in the youth as their organs are still developing thus toxic substances from alcohol damage their body organs. When people drink too much, with time they risk becoming addicted to alcohol. This is called alcoholism, or alcohol dependence. It’s a disease, and it can happen at any age, Common signs include, loss of control not being able to stop or cut down drinking, not feeling well after heavy drinking (upset stomach, sweating, shakiness, or nervousness), neglecting activities giving up or cutting back on other activities. Binge drinking happens when someone drinks more than four (for women) or five (for men) alcoholic drinks in about two hours, with the intention to getting drunk. Binge drinking is the most harmful type of drinking. It usually happens at teen or student parties TOBACCO The dangers of smoking are so great, but because of it governments get a lot of tax money from tobacco and cigarettes manufacturers, they are less hesitant to ban it totally. Government and society is aware of the danger that is why they made it illegal for teens to possess and use cigarettes. Smoking of tobacco can cause many with many diseases like respiratory and heart disease including, respiratory infections, lung cancer as well as cancer of the larynx, pancreas, stomach, & uterine cervix, bronchitis, emphysema and stillborn or premature children ().Smoking causes surges in the concentrations of catecholamine’s (the stimulator chemical messengers of the autonomic nervous system) as well as increases in carbon monoxide in the blood. Both of these short- term effects can exacerbate existing heart disease, resulting, for instance, in attacks of angina (chest pain). Nicotine raises blood pressure and heart rate, requiring the heart to work harder. It also constricts the coronary arteries, thereby lessening the supply of blood and oxygen to the heart muscle. It also promotes irregular heartbeats (cardiac arrhythmias). Smokers are not the only people harmed by tobacco. Toxic fumes from cigarettes pose a health threat to all those around smoker’s family, friends, and. Because the organic material in tobacco does not burn completely, smoke contains many toxic chemicals, including carbon monoxide, nicotine, and tar. As a result of this exposure, smokers’ children have more colds and flu, and they are more likely to take up smoking themselves when they grow up. Smokers also affect other people as well e.g. passive smoking. This is the involuntary inhaling of smoke from other people cigarettes and we all suffer when we have people smoking around us. It is called second-hand smoking and it is known to be even more dangerous than smoking itself COCAINE

Use of cocaine has increased among youth over the years, along with the myth that the drug is relatively safe, especially when it is sniffed rather than injected or smoked as ‘crack.’ In fact, no matter how it is used, cocaine can kill. It can disturb the heart’s rhythm and cause chest pain, heart attacks, and even sudden death. These effects on the heart can cause death even in the absence of any seizures. Even in the absence of underlying heart disease, a single use of only a small amount of the drug has been known to be fatal. Cocaine use is not healthful for anyone, but especially for certain groups like the youth. Although the drug has been shown to impair the function of normal hearts, it seems even more likely to cause death in people with any underlying heart disease. When pregnant women use cocaine, they not only raise the likelihood of having a miscarriage, a premature delivery, or a low-birth-weight baby, but also of having a baby with a congenital heart abnormality, especially an atrial-septal or ventricular-septal defect.

Use of cocaine raises blood pressure, constricts blood vessels, and speeds up heart rate. It may also make blood cells called platelets more likely to clump and form the blood clots that provoke many heart attacks. In addition, cocaine’s effects on the nervous system disrupt the normal rhythm of the heart, causing arrhythmias (irregular heartbeats). Recently, scientists have established that cocaine binds directly to heart muscle cells, slowing the passage of sodium ions into the cells. Cocaine also causes the release of the neurotransmitter nor epinephrine (nor adrenaline), a chemical messenger that stimulates the autonomic nervous system. Both changes can lead to arrhythmias. Heart attacks in young people are rare. However, when they do occur, cocaine is frequently the cause.

Cocaine is a highly addictive substance, and crack cocaine is substantially more addicting, as the drug is far more potent and is smoked. Users quickly develop a tolerance to crack cocaine, needing more of the substance to achieve the desired effects. Because the high from crack cocaine is so short-lived, users commonly smoke it repeatedly in order to sustain the high. This can lead to an even faster onset of addiction. Also, because crack cocaine works on the brain’s system of reward and punishment, withdrawal symptoms occur when the drug’s effects wear off. These symptoms can include depression, irritability, and extreme fatigue, anxiety, an intense craving for the drug, and sometimes even psychosis. Users will often keep using crack cocaine simply to avoid the negative effects of withdrawal

Marijuana harms in many ways, and kids are the most vulnerable to its damaging effects. Use of the drug can lead to significant health, safety, social, and learning or behavioural problems, especially for young users. Making matters worse is the fact that the marijuana available today is more potent than ever. Short term effects of marijuana use include memory loss, distorted perception, trouble with thinking and problem solving, and anxiety. Students who use marijuana may find it hard to learn, thus jeopardizing their ability to achieve their full potential. Long term effects include reduced resistance to common illnesses (colds, bronchitis, etc.), suppression of the immune system, growth disorders, increase of abnormally structured cells in the body, reduction of male sex hormones, rapid destruction of lung fibre’s and lesions (injuries) to the brain could be permanent, Study difficulties: reduced ability to learn and retain information, apathy, drowsiness, lack of motivation, personality and mood changes, inability to understand things clearly.

ACADEMIC EFFECTS OF ALCOHOL, TOBACCO AND DIFFERENT DRUG USE Heavy drinking by students can lead to positive blood alcohol levels the next day, affecting whether or not they even get up for class and, if they do, the quality of how information is processed and ultimately stored. Sleeping off a buzz, a common practice, can interfere with the sleep cycle, resulting in an increase in anxiety, jumpiness, and irritability the next day, and fatigue the day after that With evening use, marijuana has the same impact on sleep that alcohol has, throwing off the sleep cycle and impacting how a person feels for at least two additional days. Marijuana suppresses neuronal activity in the hippocampus, resulting in problems with attention, memory, and concentration. There is increasing evidence that there is an impact to motivation following marijuana use. This could be due to the effect of THC in the body blocking the passage of nutrients through cells, the neuronal suppression in the hippocampus, or the decrease in energy accompanying the fatigue that follows night time use. Marijuana significantly increases heart rate, weakens the heart muscle, and affects blood pressure- the increase in heart rate can be a concern for someone already dealing with anxiety ( and particularly panic). College students often forget why they are supposed to be in school. Is the purpose of university life to party all the time or to get the most out of the learning environment? Substance abuse can seriously affect academic performance. Aside from long-term addiction (or possible emptying you bank account) it can cause grades to plummet. How? Substance use affects you entire body, including your brain, in a variety of ways. Judgment is often the first attribute to be affected. You may find it difficult to make good decisions, to make them quickly or to be realistic when you make them. Suddenly, it becomes much easier to wait until the last minute to cram for that exam or to crank.

First of all, drugs and alcohol are a drain on people’s finances. We have all experienced the stress associated with money at one time or another. For those who abuse drugs or alcohol, financial issues are further compounded by their need to feed their habit. They frequently accumulate debt, borrow or steal money from others, or choose their substance of choice over more important things like food for their family or utility bills. While no one wants to be homeless, in debt, or engaging in criminal activities, the financial impact of drug and alcohol abuse risks not only your ability to support yourself, but it can also destroy relationships. When you abuse drugs or alcohol, you are choosing that substance over everything else, including your loved ones. Whether they are suffering from your financial choices or have become mistrustful of you, you have placed a strain on your relationships, which can ultimately ruin those connections for good. Families and others that rely on a sufferer of alcoholism are likely to experience problems related to financial troubles caused by drinking habits. The costs of alcohol increase as the alcoholic person builds tolerance to the drug in his or her system. This requires the person to take in ever-greater amounts of alcohol in order to feel the same effects. The psychological effects of this alcohol tolerance and dependency may cause the sufferer to become withdrawn and less supportive of colleagues, friends and family members. Sufferers may no longer attend social functions that do not allow drinking and may not be fully aware of their behaviour if attending functions where their drug of choice is allowed. A lack of networking and communication with peers may cause further financial problems if the sufferer loses promotion opportunities. Greater drains on income and lessened opportunities may cause undue troubles for others financially dependent on the sufferer, requiring a spouse or roommate to pick up extra hours or a second job to keep bills at a manageable level.

SOCIAL EFFECTS OF ALCOHOL, TOBACCO AND DIFFERENT DRUG USE Excessive alcohol use can affect all areas of a person’s life, including family, work and personal relationships. Family problems: Arguments over someone’s drinking can cause family and relationship problems that may lead to break up. Work problems: Drinking alcohol at work and hangovers can lead to poor performance and accidents at work, while illness can result in absenteeism. Legal problems: Drink-driving may lead to fines, loss of license and even imprisonment Misbehaviour caused by alcohol can also have disastrous effects on a pupil’s educational attainment, as well on performance in tests of intellect in later life. Compared with those pupils who have never truanted, pupils who had ever truanted from school had increased odds of having drunk alcohol in the last week (odds ratios of 2.24 for those who had truanted in the last year, 1.69 who had truanted previously). 6.5% of permanent exclusions of children from English state-funded secondary schools in 2010/11 were due to alcohol. Women, especially young women, encounter special risks in groups of drinking friends and acquaintances. In many societies, a woman who drinks seems to signal that she is at least approachable, and to some men an intoxicated woman is by definition sexually available. Such concepts as ‘acquaintance rape’ and ‘date rape’ bear witness to recent concern with this problem. A large proportion of unwanted sexual advances are mediated by alcohol. Initiation into certain groups, such as military units or college fraternities, sometimes includes drinking very large amounts of alcohol, so-called ‘binge drinking’. This pattern of drinking entails high risks of accidental injury, violence and acute alcohol-poisoning. It has long been known that a heavy-drinking lifestyle in groups of friends is relatively common in the armed forces. More recently, the focus has been on such drinking patterns on college and university campuses and what they mean for the development of problem drinking patterns later in life. INTERVENTIONS

A drug intervention is a structured, solution-oriented process undertaken to persuade someone who is abusing drugs to seek help in overcoming the addiction. Family, friends, and others involved in the person’s life use the intervention to demonstrate the extent of the effects of drinking and related behaviours. A successful intervention is not a confrontation but an opportunity for an addicted individual to accept help in taking the first step toward recovery. Often, an interventionist is invited to serve as a guide and educator before, during, and after the intervention. Some drug addicts can and do recognize the extent of the problems stemming from drug abuse and seek treatment without the need for an intervention. Most, however, are reluctant or unable to realize that drugs are responsible for the problems in their relationships, health, or work. They ignore the safety issues related to drinking and driving and other high-risk behaviours. It is common for addicts to deny that drugs are the source of the difficulties they face. They may instead blame other people or circumstances in their lives. When that happens, an intervention can break through the denial and help these individuals clearly see the effects of their drug abuse on the people who matter most to them.

...(download the rest of the essay above)

Discover more:

• Drugs essays

Recommended for you

• Drug Smugglers / Drug Smuggling book review
• Legalize Marijuana: Debate Hits Political, Economic, Medical & Societal Perspectives
• Should marijuana be legal?

About this essay:

If you use part of this page in your own work, you need to provide a citation, as follows:

Essay Sauce, Impact of Alcohol, Tobacco And Drug Abuse on Youth . Available from:<https://www.essaysauce.com/sociology-essays/alcohol-tobacco-drug-abuse/> [Accessed 29-07-24].

These Sociology essays have been submitted to us by students in order to help you with your studies.

* This essay may have been previously published on Essay.uk.com at an earlier date.

Essay Categories:

• Accounting essays
• Architecture essays
• Business essays
• Computer science essays
• Criminology essays
• Economics essays
• Education essays
• Engineering essays
• English language essays
• Environmental studies essays
• Essay examples
• Finance essays
• Geography essays
• Health essays
• History essays
• Hospitality and tourism essays
• Human rights essays
• Information technology essays
• International relations
• Leadership essays
• Linguistics essays
• Literature essays
• Management essays
• Marketing essays
• Mathematics essays
• Media essays
• Medicine essays
• Military essays
• Miscellaneous essays
• Music Essays
• Nursing essays
• Philosophy essays
• Photography and arts essays
• Politics essays
• Project management essays
• Psychology essays
• Religious studies and theology essays
• Sample essays
• Science essays
• Social work essays
• Sociology essays
• Sports essays
• Types of essay
• Zoology essays

Effects of Drug and Substance Abuse Among Youths

Drug and substances are so significant because it has become a significant problem affecting youths in both schools and out of school, and this is ahead of time to prime youths with knowledge on the effects of their use. The topic is important as drugs and substance abuse affect many youths. Usage of substance abuse and drugs has been on rising economic, socially, and public health problems, according to Lawal and Mustapha (2020). The effect of health is also related to other risky behaviours such as contracting HIV by having unprotected sex.

In studying, the rate of youths using drugs is increasing, and the leading cause is peer pressure that has resulted in poor health Chege et al. (2017). The use of Drug and substance abuse such as alcohol and illicit drugs (cocaine) is harmful, and this may lead to different changes in our body that are unhealthy (Garcia et al., 2020). Youths need to be involved in this to realize the demerits of its use. Drug and substances Abuse has become a problem that has raised concern among youth; this is why this essay is done to help youth overcome it and live a quality life.

INTRODUCTION

Adolescence is widely acknowledged as the time when a wide range of health problems, both temporary and long-term, begin, including some that will persist into adulthood. Adults who engage in unhealthy behaviors including smoking, drinking, and illegal drug use are more likely to suffer from disease and death than those who don’t engage in these activities. People who take drugs are more likely than those who don’t to be unemployed or to have an accident or to commit suicide. Drug and alcohol misuse has a significant influence on the health, well-being, and social cohesion of people, families, and communities because its consequences compound over time. SES (socio-economic level), parenting quality (including the impact of peers), and a genetic predisposition to drug addiction are all known to raise the likelihood of beginning or maintaining substance usage. This leads to a vicious cycle in which these people no longer function as productive members of society, but are instead engulfed by their addictions. The essay illustrates on the effects of drugs and substance abuse among the youth.

Drug and Substance Abuse

Adolescents are the most likely demographic to partake in alcohol use. More than 70% of teenagers have tasted alcohol by the time they reach the 12th grade, and over half of those are considered current drinkers (having consumed alcohol within the past month). Adolescents who drink excessively are also at risk of developing alcohol poisoning. Adolescents consume over 90% of their alcohol in a binge, placing them at risk for poor consequences such as car accidents, injuries, and unwanted sexual behaviour (Azpeitia et al.2019).

In the eyes of the general public and the media, it is perfectly fine to partake in alcoholic beverages. Parental control over adolescent drinking behavior can be exerted through communication, regular limitations, and close supervision. Adolescents who come from families where alcohol abuse is common may, on the other hand, view it as normal. Alcohol use disorders can emerge in adolescents who use them for the first time. Risk factors for developing a disorder include starting drinking at an early age and inheriting the condition from a parent. If a family member has an alcohol use disorder, adolescents need to know that they’re at greater risk.

A remarkable drop in adolescent smoking rates began in the 1990s and has continued ever since. This year, about 5.7 percent of 12th-graders reported current cigarette use (smoked in the previous 30 days), down from 28.3% in 1991 and 7.6% in 2018 (Schulenburg et al. 2019). Only about 2% of 12th-graders reported smoking every day, according to the National Institute on Drug Abuse at the National Institutes of Health survey. Most adult smokers first pick up the habit in their teenage years. Before the age of 19, it is quite unlikely that adolescent smokers will become adults. Children can attempt smoking as early as ten years old.

Adolescent smoking is more likely to occur if a person’s parents smoke or have friends or role models (e.g., celebrities) who smoke. High-risk behavior (e.g., excessive dieting among girls; physical fights and drunk driving, particularly among guys; use of alcohol or other substances) is another risk factor, as is a lack of problem-solving skills, access to cigarettes, and low self-esteem.

Other forms of tobacco use by teenagers are possible, as is the usage of marijuana. In the last decade, smoking tobacco use among high school students is down by a whole percentage point. Chewing, dipping, or inhaling are all methods of ingesting smoke-free products, which are less harmful than traditional cigarettes (snuff). In the United States, pipe smoking is an uncommon pastime. Cigarette smoking among persons over the age of 12 has decreased. Smoking and using smokeless tobacco products can be prevented if parents are positive role models (by not smoking or chewing). Openly address the dangers of tobacco, and encourage teenagers who already smoke or chew to stop (including supporting them in obtaining medical care if necessary) (see Smoking Cessation).

Electronic cigarette products (vaping products)

Volatilization of an active ingredient (typically nicotine or THC) in a liquid is accomplished through the use of heat in electronic cigarettes (also known as “e-cigs,” “vapes,” and “vaporizers”). There is no combustion involved. In the beginning, e-cigarettes were marketed to adult smokers as nicotine-free alternatives. Teens of middle and upper socioeconomic status have become increasingly interested in “vapes” over the past few years due to their attractiveness and increasing popularity. According to an NIH-sponsored survey, the percentage of 12th graders who currently use e-cigarettes (nicotine vaping only, no other substances included) increased dramatically from 4.5 percent in 2013 to 25.5 percent in 2019. The use of e-cigarettes by 12th-graders is estimated to be 45.6 percent (nicotine and other substances). Electronic cigarettes have different health effects than smoking because tobacco’s no combustion products (Baiden et al.2021). As a result, other chemicals found in e-cigarettes may cause lung injury, which can be acute (fulminant), chronic (chronic), or even lethal. The high concentrations of nicotine and THC found in these products are also a big draw for many people. Addiction to THC and nicotine is possible, and both can lead to toxicity. Adolescents’ first exposure to nicotine is increasingly coming from e-cigarettes, but the impact on adult smoking rates remains unclear due to this trend. Additionally, the long-term consequences of e-cigarettes are unknown.

According to a 2019 NIH survey of high school students, the prevalence of current marijuana usage among high school students was 22.3%, up from 20.6 percent in 2009 (Zvanorev et al.2019). Students in high school reported using marijuana at least once or twice in their lifetimes. For the first time in 2010, the current rate of marijuana use topped the current rate of cigarette use.

Other substances

Adolescents are only abusing substances other than alcohol, cigarettes and marijuana at a very low rate. More than one in four high school students who said they had used drugs or alcohol at least once in the past year in the NIH survey reported using inhalants (e.g., glue or aerosols): 5.3 percent ; hallucinogenic (e.g. LSD, PCP or mescaline): 6.9 percent; anabolic steroids: 1.6 percent; methamphetamines (nonprescription): 2.1 percent; heroin: 0.06 percent.

These include opioid analgesics like oxycodone, stimulants like methylphenidate and dextroamphetamine, and tranquilizers like temazepam (eg, benzodiazepines). Young people’s use of substances is characterized by experimentation and expediency (Roxburgh et al.2017), and the use of substances is described as intermittent or intensive (binge) drinking. Adolescents’ desire for ‘cool or exciting’ activities and uncontrolled self-indulgence, as well as the approbation of their peers, are seen to be the driving forces behind their intermittent or intensive substance use (Romo-Avilés et al., 2016).

Effects of drugs and substance abuse on youths

Parent-child conflict, physical and sexual abuse of children, family disintegration, academic failure, and estrangement from teachers are more specific social correlations. Distress from these events can long-term impact children’s ability to form trusting and supportive relationships with their caregivers. In addition, they foresee involvement in deviant peer networks that serve as conduits for the introduction and distribution of illegal drugs. It’s not the same as “peer pressure.” Still, it explains a developmental trajectory that is believed to “shape” a child’s social development toward deviant peers and separate them from their parents and teachers. Youth who have identified administratively (as homeless, housed by the local authorities, or involved in criminal activity) rather than clinically as at high risk of substance misuse face similar problems.

Considering the connections between substance misuse and “a recurrent and persistent pattern of dissocial, hostile, or defiant conduct” offers a different perspective. Adolescent-limited and life-span persistent conduct problems are the two subtypes of conduct difficulties. If “life-span persistent” or “early onset,” disturbed behavior may be evident as early as preschool, linked to a wide range of neurodevelopmental vulnerabilities, learning disabilities, impairments in capacity to form social relationships, and perhaps in motor development, as well as symptoms of attention deficit hyperactivity disorder that are likely to be genetic. Many of these children suffer greatly due to worry and depression brought on by their frequently challenging circumstances. Children with more severe behavioral issues are almost always sent to pediatricians because they were born into this early-onset category. Individual susceptibility, other psychosocial difficulties, the association with deviant peers, and the high availability of drugs nearly guarantee the use and misuse of drugs. However, with the right combination of measures, such as stimulant medicine when necessary, this danger can be minimized.

Adolescent or preadolescent substance abuse may signify that something is wrong with the kid’s care and development, necessitating a child welfare inquiry. “Empowerment” and “choice” might induce physicians to accept a patient’s refusal of treatment, promise complete anonymity, or exclude parents and caregivers from the treatment process. Parental involvement may be critical to the effectiveness of therapeutic intervention, and a strong desire to exclude parents may raise alarms about possible harm. Substance abuse can be seen as an additional layer on the complicated developmental and social difficulties that many child specialists are already familiar with. Anyone who appears to be of sound mind and body is presumed to be so until proven otherwise. No new skills or retraining is required for effective intervention; instead, it frequently requires careful application of already-developed skills; controlled chances for reflection and familiarization, and, at first, supervised practice.

A view of competence that may be acceptable for all doctors who routinely treat older children or teenagers includes competent history taking, correct information and counsel, and appropriate referrals. An adequate history consists of the presenting complaint and investigation of the substances used and the development and environment, including the educational and social background of the individual. If the local authority is fulfilling its duty to educate them if there is evidence of child abuse, developmental problems, or mental disturbances, and who their peers are, then this type of system review should aim to establish rapport with a young person who is perhaps skeptical and mistrustful; who is caring for them and whether that person can function as a parent. The details of their substance use must also be obtained and validated by hair and saliva or urine analysis. In particular, is there evidence of dependency or a special risk associated with pregnancy or parenteral administration? Many people may be surprised if these data are collected first. They also provide a framework for future action and advocacy on behalf of the patient.

Adolescent and adult substance abuse can be reduced with even brief treatments characterized by accurate evaluation, knowledge, and advice to minimize intake, most likely in the setting of excellent rapport rather than lecturing. This strategy, if tweaked to include parents and referrals to local statutory and voluntary agencies, might serve as the foundation for fruitful collaboration at this level of government. For example, in general practice, community pediatrics, and ERs, this could be of particular use to the staff.

Adolescent medicine can provide more extensive intervention at a higher degree of expertise. The immediate and ongoing involvement of young people and their families and liaison with or mobilizing other organizations (such as educational institutions, child welfare or family support agencies, or the juvenile justice system) can help reduce harm and promote proper care and healthy development, and good health. A new study reveals that this bundle can help reduce substance abuse and its related comorbidities. Young people’s interaction with services may be beneficial, whether by lessening loneliness or despair or being on hand when therapy opportunities emerge.

Doctors are responsible for providing “excellent clinical care” and should never be seen as a simple prescription service; therefore, it may be important to help patients wean themselves off addictive medicines and prescribe substitutes in a few cases. In light of the limited therapeutic scope of some of the currently available medications, a collaborative consultation with an adult addictions service may be the first step toward the development of “pediatric addiction medicine,” a new specialty in addiction treatment for children. A huge number of these experts is not expected to emerge. The discipline of pediatrics as a whole would benefit greatly if pediatricians and child psychiatrists worked together regularly to contribute their time and expertise to the cause. During adolescence, a person’s physical and emotional maturation and desire for self-determination can lead to the development of substance misuse (Morojele & Ramsoomar, 2016). Human growth and psychological changes are profound during adolescence, not only in the physical body but also in the brain (Morojele & Ramsoomar, 2016).

According to Oldfield et al. (2016), adolescents turn less and less to their parents for guidance and instead look to their peers. Risky behaviors can be tried out during adolescence (Morojele & Ramsoomar, 2016). Adolescent substance abuse can persist throughout adulthood, increasing the risk of drug dependence, according to Trucco (2020). Gangs are a major source of revenue for young people who use methamphetamine, especially in economically disadvantaged areas.

What Causes Youth to Use Substances

Some people believe that substance misuse and addiction are family diseases that can be passed on through genetics or the home environment. They found that the following factors may contribute to the likelihood of a child-abusing substance: they have dropped out of school; are pregnant; have experienced school failure; are suicidal or have suicidal tendencies; have parents who use substances; have violent tendencies; are economically disadvantaged, and were abused physically, sexually, or emotively as a child.

A connection has also been found between parental substance addiction and subsequent adolescent substance abuse. According to the findings of this same study, hostile parenting methods also had an impact on their children’s behavior, with parents’ negative behavior having the most impact on a youth’s decision to use and misuse various substances (Mehra et al. 2019). For example, it was shown that children whose parents are heavy users of drugs and alcohol are more likely to develop a habit of using and abusing substances themselves. This research also found that young people who grew up in families where substance misuse was a problem were more likely than their peers who did not. However, this was only one study, and no causal link has been established statistically as of yet (Mehra et al. 2019).

In addition, the study’s researchers discovered that peer influences on young people’s substance use and abuse outweigh those of families. In addition, students who performed poorly academically were twice as likely as those who performed well academically to consume other substances (Mehra et al. 2019). There was a decrease in substance use and abuse among students who were more involved in their schools. In addition to peer pressure and social interactions, youth may misuse various substances due to boredom, curiosity, gender, the media, and low self-esteem. Pressure from friends, the availability of substances at social occasions, or boredom on the weekends can lead to a desire to experiment with drugs and alcohol.

We live in a society where the media glorifies drinking, partying, and living to the extreme. Still, many prevention and therapy programs advise children to refrain from these vices. There are many reasons why a young person can choose to use or misuse drugs or alcohol or why they might decide to abstain from them for the rest of their lives. Finding out why a young person starts abusing or using drugs can be a difficult task, and it’s unlikely that we’ll ever know why all young people engage in these behaviors. Even though there may be various reasons teenagers choose to use and misuse multiple substances, these are not the only ones. Those who use and misuse substances but don’t fit into any of the above categories should be questioned about their circumstances. It’s not clear why some youngsters abstain totally, while others engage in occasional or even frequent drug or alcohol consumption, while still others get hooked. In this review, there was no detailed data about these young people.

Media Influence on Youth and Substance Use

We live in a culture where we are continuously bombarded with all kinds of media. The media heavily influences today’s kids, even if they don’t use drugs themselves. Addiction and abuse of drugs and alcohol can be seen on television, in movies, commercials, music videos, the news, and in publications and newspapers. On the other hand, youth are rarely taught how to effectively filter information and build a defense against the allure and allurement of images like these. As a result, it is imperative that young people learn how to assess these images critically, comprehend how the media affects their daily lives, and cultivate a positive self-image.

There are very few substance preventions and treatment programs that integrate these aspects in their curricula, with little or no information about media and substance use and abuse, despite the media’s influence on our young. As a society, we’ve gotten concerned with weight, and popular periodicals, TV shows, and movies present women in unrealistic images. It affects teenage substance use and abuse. As a result, our youth feel inadequate compared to this unattainable ideal of thinness. Substance abuse is a common method of weight loss among teenagers. Tobacco, ecstasy, crystal meth, and cocaine, for example, all have appetite-suppressing properties. As a result, many young people turn to these substances as weight loss aids. However, just as many over-the-counter diet medicines are ineffective, so are these drugs, which may have harmful consequences. To be truly effective at preventing and treating substance misuse among adolescents, preventative and treatment programs must consider the media’s role in shaping the minds of today’s youth, according to the author.

The Influence of the Internet on Substance Use

North American adolescents are the largest group of people who use the internet. The internet has become a routine part of most people’s everyday lives. While the internet is a wonderful resource for finding reliable information, it is rife with errors, omissions, and outright lies. Many young people use the internet to learn about various topics. They’re also interested in learning about the wide variety of available substances. Even though many websites provide accurate information about the right effects of substances, support programs, and safe usage methods (as safe as possible), many websites are full of erroneous details—Department of Justice.

In addition, chemicals are being sold and distributed via the internet. It’s easy to find information on how to make drugs like MDMA, GHB, and LSD on the internet, as well as where to acquire them, how much they cost, and websites where you can order them for delivery right to your door. It has been estimated by Interpol that in 2000, there were more than 1,000 websites around the world that offered to sell illegal narcotics (Sacco, 2018). To make your narcotics, you can order all of the necessary equipment and paraphernalia online, and it will be delivered within 24 hours or a few days, making it immediately available to anyone with a computer and a modem. It is becoming increasingly common for young people to find information about legal and illicit Raves on the internet, in addition to learning how chemicals are made, distributed, and used (Sacco, 2018). As a result, the internet has evolved into a one-stop resource for teens seeking information on where to buy, create, and meet people who promote the use of illicit drugs, such as Raves, all under one roof.

From the research conducted it has shown that most of the teens are experimenting on drugs and substance’s. This however experimentation of drugs can led to serious problem that can affect them in the future. Statistics has also proven that the number of youths that are abusing drugs is increasing in an alarming rate. In instances when the youths are starting to abuse drugs it comes with a number of problems. The parent and child relationship is hampered a lot, while the child start developing other problems such as behavioural problems. Also in some instance substance abuse has been linked to parent, when the parent uses the drugs there is higher chances that the child gets into drugs. In recent times, technology has made the rate of drugs usage to increase immensely. The use of social media and the influence of internet has cause increased of drugs and substance abuse among the youth.

Azpeitia, J., Lopez, J. L., Ruvalcaba, S. A., & Bacio, G. A. (2019). Alcohol and Marijuana Use Behaviors among Latinx Adolescents: The Interplay of Intra-and Inter-Personal Predictive Factors Differ by Gender.  Journal of Child & Adolescent Substance Abuse ,  28 (4), 238-247.

Baiden, P., Szlyk, H. S., Cavazos-Rehg, P., Onyeaka, H. K., Peoples, J., & Kasson, E. (2021). Use of electronic vaping products and mental health among adolescent high school students in the United States: The moderating effect of sex.  Journal of psychiatric research .

Chege, R., Mungai, P., & Oresi, S. (2017). An investigation of the factors contributing to drug and substance abuse among the youth in Kenya: a survey of select rehabilitation centres in Mombasa County. International Journal of Public Health, 1(1).

Garcia, O. F., Serra, E., Zacares, J. J., Calafat, A., & Garcia, F. (2020). Alcohol use and abuse and motivations for drinking and non-drinking among Spanish adolescents: do we know enough when we know parenting style?. Psychology & health, 35(6), 645-664.

Lawal, N., & Al Mustapha, A. A. (2020). Assessment of Causes and Effects of Drugs and Substances Abuse among Youth: A Case Study of Katsina Metropolis (North West Nigeria). International Neuropsychiatric Disease Journal, 1-9.

Morojele, N. K., & Ramsoomar, L. (2016). Addressing adolescent alcohol use in South Africa.  SAMJ: South African Medical Journal ,  106 (6), 551-553.

Romo-Avilés, N., Marcos-Marcos, J., Marquina-Márquez, A., & Gil-García, E. (2016). Intensive alcohol consumption by adolescents in Southern Spain: The importance of friendship.  International Journal of Drug Policy ,  31 , 138-146.

Roxburgh, A., Hall, W. D., Dobbins, T., Gisev, N., Burns, L., Pearson, S., & Degenhardt, L. (2017). Trends in heroin and pharmaceutical opioid overdose deaths in Australia.  Drug and alcohol dependence ,  179 , 291-298.

Sacco, L. N. (2018). Federal support for drug courts: in brief.  Criminal justice: government, policies and programs. US: SNOVA , 5-22.

Schulenberg, J., Johnston, L., O’Malley, P., Bachman, J., Miech, R., & Patrick, M. (2019). Monitoring the Future national survey results on drug use, 1975-2018: Volume II, college students and adults ages 19-60.

Trucco, E. M. (2020). A review of psychosocial factors linked to adolescent substance use.  Pharmacology Biochemistry and Behavior ,  196 , 172969.

Zvonarev, V., Fatuki, T. A., & Tregubenko, P. (2019). The public health concerns of marijuana legalization: An overview of current trends.  Cureus ,  11 (9).

Cite This Work

To export a reference to this article please select a referencing style below:

Related Essays

An argumentative essay on death penalty, importance of assessing all patients for signs of abuse or domestic violence and populations that are most at risk of being abused, tragic school shooting, black lives matters movement, unveiling educational disparities: standardized testing and equity., missing and murdered indigenous people in canada, popular essay topics.

• American Dream
• Artificial Intelligence
• Black Lives Matter
• Bullying Essay
• Career Goals Essay
• Causes of the Civil War
• Child Abusing
• Civil Rights Movement
• Community Service
• Cultural Identity
• Cyber Bullying
• Death Penalty
• Depression Essay
• Domestic Violence
• Freedom of Speech
• Global Warming
• Gun Control
• Human Trafficking
• I Believe Essay
• Immigration
• Importance of Education
• Israel and Palestine Conflict
• Leadership Essay
• Legalizing Marijuanas
• Mental Health
• National Honor Society
• Police Brutality
• Pollution Essay
• Racism Essay
• Romeo and Juliet
• Same Sex Marriages
• Social Media
• The Great Gatsby
• The Yellow Wallpaper
• Time Management
• To Kill a Mockingbird
• Violent Video Games
• What Makes You Unique
• Why I Want to Be a Nurse
• Send us an e-mail

Alcohol Use Disorder

• Binge Drinking
• Drinking Problem

Illegal Drug Addiction

Prescriptions.

• Benzodiazepines
• Antidepressants
• Inpatient Rehab
• Residential Rehab

Alcohol Rehab

• Methadone Clinics
• Sober Living
• Family Therapy

Recovery Programs

• 12-Step Programs
• SMART Recovery
• Families of Addicts

Early Recovery

• Stages of Change
• Handle Triggers
• Rehab Insights

Sustained Recovery

• Sober Curious Life

Long-Term Recovery

• Jellinek Curve
• Life After Rehab

Find Treatment

• Find Addiction Center
• Find Suboxone Center

Teen Drug and Alcohol Use in the US: Statistics

In This Article

Teen drug and alcohol use in the United States continues to be a significant public health concern. About 2 million teens (approximately 8%) used drugs in the past month.

We need to understand these numbers to help teens stay safe. Using drugs and alcohol early can lead to problems like addiction, mental health issues, and an increased risk of accidents and injuries.

This article will talk about how many teens use drugs and alcohol, how these numbers have changed recently, and why some teens are more likely to use them than others. This information helps us make plans to keep teens away from drugs and alcohol.

Most Commonly Used Substances Among Teenagers

It helps to know the substances most frequently used by teenagers to develop targeted prevention and intervention strategies. Here are some important data about this:

• Alcohol remains the most widely used substance among teens, with approximately 46% of 12th-graders, 31% of 10th-graders, and 15% of 8th-graders reporting alcohol use in the past 12 months in 2023.
• Marijuana is the second most commonly used substance, with about 29% of 12th-graders, 18% of 10th-graders, and 8% of 8th-graders reporting use in the past 12 months in 2023.
• Nicotine vaping has seen significant drops but remains a concern, with 18% of 10th-graders and 23% of 12th-graders reporting use within the past year.
• Prescription medications, such as stimulants like Adderall and Ritalin, and painkillers like OxyContin and Vicodin, are also commonly abused by teens.

The following graph shows the most commonly used substances among teenagers in 2023.

Substance Use Disorders Among Teenagers

A substantial number of teenagers who use drugs or alcohol develop substance use disorders, highlighting the severity of the issue.

• Among youth aged 12 to 17, 407,000 met the criteria for an alcohol use disorder in the past year, representing a significant portion of those who consume alcohol.
• Twice as many 12 to 17-year-olds meet the criteria for an illicit drug use disorder compared to those with an alcohol use disorder, with 788,000 teens in this age group meeting the criteria for an illicit drug use disorder in the past year.
• The percentage of teenagers who use drugs or alcohol and subsequently develop a substance use disorder varies depending on the substance and the age group.
• The high prevalence of substance use disorders among teens underscores the need for early intervention and accessible treatment options.

The graph below shows the overall substance use disorder among teens.

Online Therapy Can Help

Over 3 million people use BetterHelp. Their services are:

• Professional and effective
• Affordable and convenient
• Personalized and discreet
• Easy to start

Answer a few questions to get started

Trends in Teen Drug and Alcohol Use

Recent data indicate that the use of illegal drugs among teens has generally declined or stayed the same at lower levels compared to rates before the pandemic.

• A survey by Monitoring the Future found that in 2023, fewer teens reported using illegal drugs in the past year compared to before the pandemic.
• This trend suggests that the decrease in teen drug use seen during the COVID-19 pandemic has continued.

The line graph below shows the trends of alcohol and drug use among 12th graders from 2022 to 2023.

The data includes:

• Alcohol Use: A decrease from 51.9% in 2022 to 45.7% in 2023.
• Illicit Drug Use (excluding marijuana): Stable at 7.4%.
• Marijuana Use: Stable at 29.0%.
• Vaping: A decrease from 27.3% in 2022 to 23.2% in 2023.

Rise in Overdose Deaths

Despite the decline in overall substance use among teens, there has been a troubling rise in overdose deaths.

• Deaths due to drug overdose among adolescents more than doubled from 2018 (253 deaths) to 2022 (723 deaths), with the largest increases among Hispanic and Black adolescents.
• This increase is largely attributed to the contamination of drugs with illicit fentanyl, a potent synthetic opioid.
• The presence of fentanyl in counterfeit pills that resemble prescription medications has made drug use more dangerous, even if the prevalence of use has not increased.

Contributing Factors to Trends

There are many reasons why teen drug and alcohol use goes up and down over time. Here are some of the biggest factors:

• Social media: Content on social media can make drugs and alcohol seem cool, which might make teens more likely to try them. Teens who spend much time on social media are more at risk.
• Mental health and stress: Teens who are stressed or anxious might use drugs or alcohol to feel better. We need to give them better help for mental health and stress.
• Changing strategies: Instead of just saying no to everything, we’re teaching teens the risks of drugs and alcohol and how to stay safe if they do use them.

Get Professional Help

BetterHelp can connect you to an addiction and mental health counselor.

Socioeconomic Factors and Teen Drug and Alcohol Use

Socioeconomic factors influence teen drug and alcohol use. They shape the likelihood of substance use and the severity of its consequences. These factors include poverty, family structure, and access to prevention programs.

Poverty during adolescence is a significant risk factor for developing drug use disorders later in life.

• Adolescents experiencing poverty are more likely to use substances.
• This increased risk is linked to the stress and challenges associated with low socioeconomic status.
• A Swedish study found a direct correlation between adolescent poverty and drug use disorders in young adulthood.
• The impact was more pronounced in females with 24% and 13% in males. Mental health issues in adolescence contributed to this association.

Family Structure

Family structure plays a crucial role in adolescent substance use.

• Teenagers from single-parent homes, especially those living with single fathers, are more likely to use drugs than those from two-parent households.
• This increased risk may be due to factors like differences in parental supervision, communication, and the unique challenges of single-parent families.
• Studies have shown that daughters living with single fathers have higher rates of drug use compared to those living with single mothers.

Access to Prevention Programs

Prevention programs can effectively reduce the risk of substance use among teens.

• Comprehensive prevention programs target multiple risk factors. These programs often include education, skills training, and parental involvement.
• Evidence-based programs like LifeSkills Training and the Good Behavior Game have shown long-term benefits.
• Fair access to prevention programs is essential for reaching all teens.

Relevant Studies

Here are some studies that discuss teen substance use:

• Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA): According to SAMHSA, adolescents living in households with lower family incomes are at a higher risk for mental illness, substance use disorders, and co-occurring disorders.
• Monitoring the Future (MTF): The MTF survey has consistently shown that substance use varies significantly among different socioeconomic statuses, with higher rates of alcohol and drug use reported among teens in higher socioeconomic brackets, potentially due to greater disposable income and access.
• Community Influence: Research published in the American Journal of Public Health found that community-level interventions focusing on improving neighborhood conditions and increasing community cohesion were effective in reducing substance use among adolescents.

These studies show that complex factors can influence teen drug use, such as socioeconomic status, community environment, and personal risks. We need a comprehensive approach to help teens deal with this problem.

What's Next?

• What Is Rehab Like?
• Why Call an Addiction Hotline?
• How to Sober Up
• Tapering off of alcohol

Get matched with an affordable mental health counselor

Related Articles

The Pandemic's Toll: Substance Abuse and Addiction Trends During COVID-19

Medically Reviewed by: Annamarie Coy

Benzodiazepines Addiction: Statistics and Effects

Substance abuse and domestic violence: national statistics, updated overdose statistics 2024: trends in drug-related deaths, gender differences in substance abuse and addiction: statistics, impact of media and pop culture on substance abuse trends: statistics.

• “ Is Teen Drug and Alcohol Use Declining? ” USA Facts, 2023.
• Dickerson, A. “ Do Socioeconomic Factors Affect Teen Drug Use? ” Ember Recovery, 2024.
• “ Does Socioeconomic Advantage Lessen the Risk of Adolescent Substance Use? ” Hazelden Betty Ford Foundation, 2018.
• “ The Most Commonly Used Drugs By Teens. ” Adolescent Wellness Academy, 2021.
• “ What Is the Number One Drug Used by Teens? ” Clearfork Academy, 2024.
• “ Teen and Youth Addiction Statistics and Demographics. ” Caron.
• Johnson, S. R., “ Teen Drug Use, by the Numbers. ” US News, 2024.
• Gray, K. M., & Squeglia, L. M. “ Research Review: What Have We Learned About Adolescent Substance Use? ” Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry, and Allied Disciplines, 2018.
• Whitesell, M., et al. “ Familial, Social, and Individual Factors Contributing to Risk for Adolescent Substance Use. ” Journal of Addiction, 2013.

Related Pages

• The Pandemic’s Toll: Substance Abuse and Addiction Trends During COVID-19 Most of us have felt the weight of the COVID-19...
• Benzodiazepines Addiction: Statistics and Effects Benzodiazepines, medications often prescribed for anxiety and sleep issues, are...
• Substance Abuse and Domestic Violence: National Statistics Every nine seconds, someone you know — a friend, neighbor,...
• Updated Overdose Statistics 2024: Trends in Drug-Related Deaths The United States is affected by a rapidly changing overdose...
• Gender Differences in Substance Abuse and Addiction: Statistics Substance abuse and addiction affect millions of people worldwide, but...
• Impact of Media and Pop Culture on Substance Abuse Trends: Statistics Media and pop culture have a profound influence on societal...

Evidence Based

Who answers.

You are using an outdated browser. Please upgrade your browser to improve your experience.

Glouster’s youth grapple with the impact of substance use disorder in a new book

By: Theo Peck-Suzuki | Report for America Posted on: Tuesday, July 23, 2024

GLOUSTER, Ohio (WOUB/Report for America) — After Briley Mash saw her dad hit her mom, her uncle carried her to her grandparents’ house. Her father ran away; someone called the police. Briley and her sister sat in front of the TV, watching “Peppa Pig.”

“That night is engraved in my head and when I think about it I cry,” wrote Briley, who will start seventh grade in the fall. “That is all I can do. I can’t fix what’s done. I wish I could go back to that night and stop it but I can’t.”

For as long as Briley can remember, her father struggled with substance use disorder. He died three years ago from a drug overdose. Briley’s essay — a reflection on her father’s death — is one of 115 in the new book “Young Voices from a Small Town” from Monday Creek Publishing. The book is the unlikely result of a contest for students at Trimble Elementary/Middle School, each of whom wrote about why they think it’s important to live in a drug-free community.

The contest was originally conceived as part of the annual drug abuse prevention campaign Red Ribbon Week. There was no discussion of a book, originally — it was just a way to encourage kids to write, with the added incentive that the winner got to dunk a teacher in a dunk tank.

“The first year, we had an overwhelming response of 70 essays,” recalled Trimble school outreach caseworker Becky Handa.

“We have many students that are in this district that are raised by kin because they’ve lost a parent to overdose, they have parents that are incarcerated, they have parents that are in recovery,” Handa said.

In her essay, Briley reckoned with the tangle of feelings she still has when she thinks of her father.

“He chose drugs over his kids but my mom says he loves us but I think if he did loves us, why did he do drugs?” she wrote.

Later in the essay, she added, “I hated him for everything that he put us through but I still love him.”

“You know, when you talk about writing — with kids, there’s a lot of pushback, like, ‘We don’t wanna write an essay.’ There was zero pushback with this,” he said.

Handa said the essays became the talk of the school staff. Eventually, someone approached the Red Ribbon Week committee and asked if there was a way for others to read them. That’s when the idea came about to publish a book.

Over the next year, the Tomcat Bridgebuilders — a local community organization of which Handa is president — worked with Monday Creek Publishing to put the materials together and coax uneasy parents into allowing their children’s pieces to be published (many were reluctant, even though none of the essaywriters are identified by name). The finished product was published July 6 and is available for order on Amazon. It will also be available next week at Little Professor Bookstore in Athens.

Handa said the plan is to make this the first in a series.

“I’m sitting on 300 essays,” she said.

As for Briley, she can hardly believe the essay she wrote is now a published work.

“It’s crazy,” she said. “At first … I was shocked, and I was like, ‘You’re lying. It has to be a joke.’ But it wasn’t.”

Information

• Author Services

Initiatives

You are accessing a machine-readable page. In order to be human-readable, please install an RSS reader.

All articles published by MDPI are made immediately available worldwide under an open access license. No special permission is required to reuse all or part of the article published by MDPI, including figures and tables. For articles published under an open access Creative Common CC BY license, any part of the article may be reused without permission provided that the original article is clearly cited. For more information, please refer to https://www.mdpi.com/openaccess .

Feature papers represent the most advanced research with significant potential for high impact in the field. A Feature Paper should be a substantial original Article that involves several techniques or approaches, provides an outlook for future research directions and describes possible research applications.

Feature papers are submitted upon individual invitation or recommendation by the scientific editors and must receive positive feedback from the reviewers.

Editor’s Choice articles are based on recommendations by the scientific editors of MDPI journals from around the world. Editors select a small number of articles recently published in the journal that they believe will be particularly interesting to readers, or important in the respective research area. The aim is to provide a snapshot of some of the most exciting work published in the various research areas of the journal.

Original Submission Date Received: .

• Active Journals
• Find a Journal
• Proceedings Series
• For Authors
• For Reviewers
• For Editors
• For Librarians
• For Publishers
• For Societies
• For Conference Organizers
• Open Access Policy
• Institutional Open Access Program
• Special Issues Guidelines
• Editorial Process
• Research and Publication Ethics
• Article Processing Charges
• Testimonials
• Preprints.org
• SciProfiles
• Encyclopedia

Article Menu

• Subscribe SciFeed
• Recommended Articles
• Google Scholar
• on Google Scholar
• Table of Contents

Find support for a specific problem in the support section of our website.

Please let us know what you think of our products and services.

Visit our dedicated information section to learn more about MDPI.

JSmol Viewer

Dna sequence variations affecting serotonin transporter transcriptional regulation and activity: do they impact alcohol addiction.

1. Introduction

2.1. allelic frequencies, 2.2. genotipic frequencies, 2.3. haplotype analysis, 3. discussion, 4. materials and methods, 4.1. analyzed populations and sampling, 4.2. dna extraction, 4.3. snp and vntr region genotyping, 4.4. polymerase chain reaction assays, 4.5. mini-sequencing assay, 4.6. vntr region genotyping, 4.7. haplotype analyses, 4.8. statistical analysis, author contributions, institutional review board statement, informed consent statement, data availability statement, acknowledgments, conflicts of interest.

• Haley, S.J.; Jardine, S.J.; Kelvin, E.A.; Herrmann, C.; Maroko, A.R. Neighborhood Alcohol Outlet Density, Historical Redlining, and Violent Crime in NYC 2014–2018. Int. J. Environ. Res. Public Health 2023 , 20 , 3212. [ Google Scholar ] [ CrossRef ] [ PubMed ]
• Ernst, M. Behavioral Predictors of Substance-Use Initiation in Adolescents With and Without Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder. Pediatrics 2006 , 117 , 2030–2039. [ Google Scholar ] [ CrossRef ] [ PubMed ]
• Slater, M.D.; Hayes, A.F.; Goodall, C.E.; Ewoldsen, D.R. Increasing support for alcohol-control enforcement through news coverage of alcohol’s role in injuries and crime. J. Stud. Alcohol. Drugs 2012 , 73 , 311–315. [ Google Scholar ] [ CrossRef ] [ PubMed ]
• Schuckit, M.A. Alcohol-use disorders. Lancet 2009 , 373 , 492–501. [ Google Scholar ] [ CrossRef ] [ PubMed ]
• Tobore, T.O. On the Neurobiological Role of Oxidative Stress in Alcohol-Induced Impulsive, Aggressive and Suicidal Behavior. Subst. Use Misuse 2019 , 54 , 2290–2303. [ Google Scholar ] [ CrossRef ] [ PubMed ]
• Coriale, G.; Gencarelli, S.; Battagliese, G.; Delfino, D.; Fiorentino, D.; Petrella, C.; Greco, A.; Ralli, M.; Attilia, M.L.; Messina, M.P.; et al. Physiological Responses to Induced Stress in Individuals Affected by Alcohol Use Disorder with Dual Diagnosis and Alexithymia. Clin. Ter. 2020 , 171 , e120–e129. [ Google Scholar ] [ CrossRef ] [ PubMed ]
• Ledda, R.; Battagliese, G.; Attilia, F.; Rotondo, C.; Pisciotta, F.; Gencarelli, S.; Greco, A.; Fiore, M.; Ceccanti, M.; Attilia, M.L. Drop-out, relapse and abstinence in a cohort of alcoholic people under detoxification. Physiol. Behav. 2019 , 198 , 67–75. [ Google Scholar ] [ CrossRef ] [ PubMed ]
• Ceccanti, M.; Coriale, G.; Hamilton, D.A.; Carito, V.; Coccurello, R.; Scalese, B.; Ciafrè, S.; Codazzo, C.; Messina, M.P.; Chaldakov, G.N.; et al. Virtual Morris task responses in individuals in an abstinence phase from alcohol. Can. J. Physiol. Pharmacol. 2018 , 96 , 128–136. [ Google Scholar ] [ CrossRef ] [ PubMed ]
• Bryant, K.J.; Nelson, S.; Braithwaite, R.S.; Roach, D. Integrating HIV/AIDS and alcohol research. Alcohol. Res. Heal. J. Natl. Inst. Alcohol. Abus. Alcohol. 2010 , 33 , 167–178. [ Google Scholar ]
• Fama, R.; Le Berre, A.-P.; Sassoon, S.A.; Zahr, N.M.; Pohl, K.M.; Pfefferbaum, A.; Sullivan, E.V. Memory impairment in alcohol use disorder is associated with regional frontal brain volumes. Drug Alcohol. Depend. 2021 , 228 , 109058. [ Google Scholar ] [ CrossRef ]
• Ministry of Health. Relazione del Ministro della Salute al Parlamento Sugli Interventi Realizzati ai Sensi Della Legge 30.3.2001 N.125 “Legge Quadro in Materia di Alcol e Problemi Alcolcorrelati” Anni 2007–2008 e Successive Modifiche 2009. Available online: https://www.salute.gov.it/imgs/C_17_pubblicazioni_1451_allegato.pdf (accessed on 28 May 2024).
• Ciafrè, S.; Carito, V.; Ferraguti, G.; Greco, A.; Chaldakov, G.N.; Fiore, M.; Ceccanti, M. How alcohol drinking affects our genes: An epigenetic point of view. Biochem. Cell Biol. 2019 , 97 , 345–356. [ Google Scholar ] [ CrossRef ] [ PubMed ]
• Tulisiak, C.T.; Harris, R.A.; Ponomarev, I. DNA modifications in models of alcohol use disorders. Alcohol 2017 , 60 , 19–30. [ Google Scholar ] [ CrossRef ] [ PubMed ]
• Carito, V.; Ceccanti, M.; Ferraguti, G.; Coccurello, R.; Ciafrè, S.; Tirassa, P.; Fiore, M. NGF and BDNF Alterations by Prenatal Alcohol Exposure. Curr. Neuropharmacol. 2019 , 17 , 308–317. [ Google Scholar ] [ CrossRef ]
• Ciafrè, S.; Ferraguti, G.; Greco, A.; Polimeni, A.; Ralli, M.; Ceci, F.M.; Fiore, M. Alcohol as an early life stressor: Epigenetics, metabolic, neuroendocrine and neurobehavioral implications. Neurosci. Biobehav. Rev. 2020 , 118 , 654–668. [ Google Scholar ] [ CrossRef ] [ PubMed ]
• Haan, E.; Westmoreland, K.E.; Schellhas, L.; Sallis, H.M.; Taylor, G.; Zuccolo, L.; Munafò, M.R. Prenatal smoking, alcohol and caffeine exposure and offspring externalizing disorders: A systematic review and meta-analysis. Addiction 2022 , 117 , 2602–2613. [ Google Scholar ] [ CrossRef ] [ PubMed ]
• Oei, J.L. Alcohol use in pregnancy and its impact on the mother and child. Addiction 2020 , 115 , 2148–2163. [ Google Scholar ] [ CrossRef ]
• Ceci, F.M.; Ferraguti, G.; Petrella, C.; Greco, A.; Ralli, M.; Iannitelli, A.; Carito, V.; Tirassa, P.; Chaldakov, G.N.; Messina, M.P.; et al. Nerve Growth Factor in Alcohol Use Disorders. Curr. Neuropharmacol. 2020 , 19 , 45–60. [ Google Scholar ] [ CrossRef ] [ PubMed ]
• Terracina, S.; Ferraguti, G.; Tarani, L.; Messina, M.P.; Lucarelli, M.; Vitali, M.; De Persis, S.; Greco, A.; Minni, A.; Polimeni, A.; et al. Transgenerational Abnormalities Induced by Paternal Preconceptual Alcohol Drinking. Findings from Humans and Animal Models. Curr. Neuropharmacol. 2021 , 19 , 1158–1173. [ Google Scholar ] [ CrossRef ] [ PubMed ]
• Chang, R.C.; Wang, H.; Bedi, Y.; Golding, M.C. Preconception paternal alcohol exposure exerts sex-specific effects on offspring growth and long-term metabolic programming. Epigenetics Chromatin 2019 , 12 , 1–17. [ Google Scholar ] [ CrossRef ]
• Roach, A.N.; Zimmel, K.N.; Thomas, K.N.; Basel, A.; Bhadsavle, S.S.; Golding, M.C. Preconception paternal alcohol exposure decreases IVF embryo survival and pregnancy success rates in a mouse model. Mol. Hum. Reprod. 2023 , 29 , gaad002. [ Google Scholar ] [ CrossRef ]
• American Psychiatric Association. Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders ; American Psychiatric Association: Washington, DC, USA, 2013. [ Google Scholar ] [ CrossRef ]
• Lesch, O.M.; Walter, H. Subtypes of alcoholism and their role in therapy. Alcohol Alcohol. 1996 , 31 , 63–67. [ Google Scholar ] [ CrossRef ] [ PubMed ]
• Malcolm, R.; Anton, R.F.; Randall, C.L.; Johnston, A.; Brady, K.; Thevos, A. A Placebo-Controlled Trial of Buspirone in Anxious Inpatient Alcoholics. Alcohol. Clin. Exp. Res. 1992 , 16 , 1007–1013. [ Google Scholar ] [ CrossRef ] [ PubMed ]
• Ivanova, D.; Giannouli, V. Lesch Type III Alcoholism in Bulgarian Women: Implications and Recommendations for Psychotherapy. Int. J. Caring Sci. 2017 , 10 , 1569–1576. [ Google Scholar ]
• Giannouli, V. Violence in severe mental illness: Is cognition missing in the associations with ethnicity, cannabis and alcohol? Australas Psychiatry 2017 , 25 , 633. [ Google Scholar ] [ CrossRef ] [ PubMed ]
• Reilly, M.T.; Noronha, A.; Goldman, D.; Koob, G.F. Genetic studies of alcohol dependence in the context of the addiction cycle. Neuropharmacology 2017 , 122 , 3–21. [ Google Scholar ] [ CrossRef ] [ PubMed ]
• Stickel, F.; Moreno, C.; Hampe, J.; Morgan, M.Y. The genetics of alcohol dependence and alcohol-related liver disease. J. Hepatol. 2017 , 66 , 195–211. [ Google Scholar ] [ CrossRef ] [ PubMed ]
• Dick, D.M.; Balcke, E.; McCutcheon, V.; Francis, M.; Kuo, S.; Salvatore, J.; Meyers, J.; Bierut, L.J.; Schuckit, M.; Hesselbrock, V.; et al. The collaborative study on the genetics of alcoholism: Sample and clinical data. Genes. Brain Behav. 2023 , 22 , e12860. [ Google Scholar ] [ CrossRef ] [ PubMed ]
• Farris, S.P.; Wolen, A.R.; Miles, M.F. Using expression genetics to study the neurobiology of ethanol and alcoholism. Int. Rev. Neurobiol. 2010 , 91 , 95–128. [ Google Scholar ] [ CrossRef ] [ PubMed ]
• Lai, D.; Johnson, E.C.; Colbert, S.; Pandey, G.; Chan, G.; Bauer, L.; Francis, M.W.; Hesselbrock, V.; Kamarajan, C.; Kramer, J.; et al. Evaluating risk for alcohol use disorder: Polygenic risk scores and family history. Alcohol. Clin. Exp. Res. 2022 , 46 , 374–383. [ Google Scholar ] [ CrossRef ]
• Johnson, E.C.; Salvatore, J.E.; Lai, D.; Merikangas, A.K.; Nurnberger, J.I.; Tischfield, J.A.; Xuei, X.; Kamarajan, C.; Wetherill, L.; Rice, J.P.; et al. The collaborative study on the genetics of alcoholism: Genetics. Genes. Brain Behav. 2023 , 22 , e12856. [ Google Scholar ] [ CrossRef ]
• D’Angelo, A.; Petrella, C.; Greco, A.; Ralli, M.; Vitali, M.; Giovagnoli, R.; De Persis, S.; Fiore, M.; Ceccanti, M.; Messina, M.P. Acute alcohol intoxication: A clinical overview. Clin. Ter. 2022 , 173 , 280–291. [ Google Scholar ] [ CrossRef ]
• Edenberg, H.J.; Foroud, T. Genetics of alcoholism. Handb. Clin. Neurol. 2014 , 125 , 561–571. [ Google Scholar ] [ CrossRef ] [ PubMed ]
• Koob, G.F.; Volkow, N.D. Neurobiology of addiction: A neurocircuitry analysis. Lancet Psychiatry 2016 , 3 , 760–773. [ Google Scholar ] [ CrossRef ] [ PubMed ]
• Kramer, J.; Dick, D.M.; King, A.; Ray, L.A.; Sher, K.J.; Vena, A.; Vendruscolo, L.F.; Acion, L. Mechanisms of Alcohol Addiction: Bridging Human and Animal Studies. Alcohol. Alcohol. 2021 , 55 , 603–607. [ Google Scholar ] [ CrossRef ] [ PubMed ]
• Koob, G.F. Neurocircuitry of alcohol addiction: Synthesis from animal models. Handb. Clin. Neurol. 2014 , 125 , 33–54. [ Google Scholar ] [ CrossRef ]
• Ferraguti, G.; Pascale, E.; Lucarelli, M. Alcohol Addiction: A Molecular Biology Perspective. Curr. Med. Chem. 2015 , 22 , 670–684. [ Google Scholar ] [ CrossRef ]
• Margoob, M.A.; Mushtaq, D. Serotonin transporter gene polymorphism and psychiatric disorders: Is there a link? Indian J. Psychiatry 2011 , 53 , 289–299. [ Google Scholar ] [ CrossRef ]
• Lovinger, D.M. Communication networks in the brain: Neurons, receptors, neurotransmitters, and alcohol. Alcohol. Res. Heal. J. Natl. Inst. Alcohol. Abus. Alcohol. 2008 , 31 , 196–214. [ Google Scholar ]
• Furukawa, T.A.; Cipriani, A.; Cowen, P.J.; Leucht, S.; Egger, M.; Salanti, G. Optimal dose of selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors, venlafaxine, and mirtazapine in major depression: A systematic review and dose-response meta-analysis. Lancet Psychiatry 2019 , 6 , 601–609. [ Google Scholar ] [ CrossRef ]
• Philibert, R.A.; Sandhu, H.; Hollenbeck, N.; Gunter, T.; Adams, W.; Madan, A. The relationship of 5HTT (SLC6A4) methylation and genotype on mRNA expression and liability to major depression and alcohol dependence in subjects from the Iowa Adoption Studies. Am. J. Med. Genet. Part B Neuropsychiatr. Genet. Off. Publ. Int. Soc. Psychiatr. Genet. 2008 , 147B , 543–549. [ Google Scholar ] [ CrossRef ]
• Tahara, T.; Shibata, T.; Okubo, M.; Sumi, K.; Ishizuka, T.; Nakamura, M.; Nagasaka, M.; Nakagawa, Y.; Ohmiya, N.; Arisawa, T.; et al. Change in DNA methylation patterns of SLC6A4 gene in the gastric mucosa in functional dyspepsia. PLoS ONE 2014 , 9 , e105565. [ Google Scholar ] [ CrossRef ]
• Iurescia, S.; Seripa, D.; Rinaldi, M. Looking Beyond the 5-HTTLPR Polymorphism: Genetic and Epigenetic Layers of Regulation Affecting the Serotonin Transporter Gene Expression. Mol. Neurobiol. 2017 , 54 , 8386–8403. [ Google Scholar ] [ CrossRef ] [ PubMed ]
• Kranzler, H.R.; Armeli, S.; Tennen, H.; Covault, J.; Feinn, R.; Arias, A.J.; Pettinati, H.M.; Oncken, C. A double-blind, randomized trial of sertraline for alcohol dependence: Moderation by age of onset [corrected] and 5-hydroxytryptamine transporter-linked promoter region genotype. J. Clin. Psychopharmacol. 2011 , 31 , 22–30. [ Google Scholar ] [ CrossRef ]
• Mandal, T.; Bairy, L.K.; Sharma, P.S.V.N. Association between functional polymorphisms in serotonin transporter gene (SLC6A4) and escitalopram treatment response in depressive patients in a South Indian population. Eur. J. Clin. Pharmacol. 2020 , 76 , 807–814. [ Google Scholar ] [ CrossRef ] [ PubMed ]
• Ren, F.; Ma, Y.; Zhu, X.; Guo, R.; Wang, J.; He, L. Pharmacogenetic association of bi- and triallelic polymorphisms of SLC6A4 with antidepressant response in major depressive disorder. J. Affect. Disord. 2020 , 273 , 254–264. [ Google Scholar ] [ CrossRef ]
• Pascale, E.; Ferraguti, G.; Codazzo, C.; Passarelli, F.; Mancinelli, R.; Bonvicini, C.; Bruno, S.M.; Lucarelli, M.; Ceccanti, M. Alcohol dependence and serotonin transporter functional polymorphisms 5-HTTLPR and rs25531 in an Italian population. Alcohol Alcohol. 2015 , 50 , 259–265. [ Google Scholar ] [ CrossRef ] [ PubMed ]
• Fratelli, C.; Siqueira, J.; Silva, C.; Ferreira, E.; Silva, I. 5httlpr genetic variant and major depressive disorder: A review. Genes 2020 , 11 , 1–21. [ Google Scholar ] [ CrossRef ]
• Wang, J.-Y.; Fan, Q.-Y.; He, J.-H.; Zhu, S.-G.; Huang, C.-P.; Zhang, X.; Zhu, J.-H. SLC6A4 Repeat and Single-Nucleotide Polymorphisms Are Associated With Depression and Rest Tremor in Parkinson’s Disease: An Exploratory Study. Front. Neurol. 2019 , 10 , 333. [ Google Scholar ] [ CrossRef ]
• Tanahashi, S.; Tanii, H.; Konishi, Y.; Otowa, T.; Sasaki, T.; Tochigi, M.; Okazaki, Y.; Kaiya, H.; Okada, M. Association of Serotonin Transporter Gene (5-HTTLPR/rs25531) Polymorphism with Comorbidities of Panic Disorder. Neuropsychobiology 2021 , 80 , 333–341. [ Google Scholar ] [ CrossRef ] [ PubMed ]
• Chang, H.-A.; Fang, W.-H.; Liu, Y.-P.; Tzeng, N.-S.; Shyu, J.-F.; Wan, F.-J.; Huang, S.-Y.; Chang, T.-C.; Chang, C.-C. Sex-specific pathways among tri-allelic serotonin transporter polymorphism, trait neuroticism and generalized anxiety disorder. J. Psychiatry Neurosci. 2020 , 45 , 379–386. [ Google Scholar ] [ CrossRef ]
• Alshogran, O.Y.; Al-Eitan, L.N.; Altawalbeh, S.M.; Aman, H.A. Association of DRD4 exon III and 5-HTTLPR VNTR genetic polymorphisms with psychiatric symptoms in hemodialysis patients. PLoS ONE 2021 , 16 , e0249284. [ Google Scholar ] [ CrossRef ]
• Hu, X.-Z.; Lipsky, R.H.; Zhu, G.; Akhtar, L.A.; Taubman, J.; Greenberg, B.D.; Xu, K.; Arnold, P.D.; Richter, M.A.; Kennedy, J.L.; et al. Serotonin transporter promoter gain-of-function genotypes are linked to obsessive-compulsive disorder. Am. J. Hum. Genet. 2006 , 78 , 815–826. [ Google Scholar ] [ CrossRef ]
• Martin, J.; Cleak, J.; Willis-Owen, S.A.G.; Flint, J.; Shifman, S. Mapping regulatory variants for the serotonin transporter gene based on allelic expression imbalance. Mol. Psychiatry 2007 , 12 , 421–422. [ Google Scholar ] [ CrossRef ]
• Seneviratne, C.; Huang, W.; Ait-Daoud, N.; Li, M.D.; Johnson, B.A. Characterization of a functional polymorphism in the 3’ UTR of SLC6A4 and its association with drinking intensity. Alcohol. Clin. Exp. Res. 2009 , 33 , 332–339. [ Google Scholar ] [ CrossRef ]
• Pinto, C.; Souza, R.P.; Lioult, D.; Semeralul, M.; Kennedy, J.L.; Warsh, J.J.; Wong, A.H.; De Luca, V. Parent of origin effect and allelic expression imbalance of the serotonin transporter in bipolar disorder and suicidal behaviour. Eur. Arch. Psychiatry Clin. Neurosci. 2011 , 261 , 533–538. [ Google Scholar ] [ CrossRef ]
• Hui, P.; Yang, J.; Wang, J.; Zhao, L.; Wang, X.; Su, X.; Wang, J.; Ma, W.; Fan, J.; Chen, W.; et al. Association between 5-hydroxytryptamine gene polymorphism rs140700 and primary insomnia in Chinese population. Intern. Med. J. 2021 , 51 , 732–738. [ Google Scholar ] [ CrossRef ] [ PubMed ]
• Prasad, H.C.; Zhu, C.-B.; McCauley, J.L.; Samuvel, D.J.; Ramamoorthy, S.; Shelton, R.C.; Hewlett, W.A.; Sutcliffe, J.S.; Blakely, R.D. Human serotonin transporter variants display altered sensitivity to protein kinase G and p38 mitogen-activated protein kinase. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA 2005 , 102 , 11545–11550. [ Google Scholar ] [ CrossRef ] [ PubMed ]
• Prasad, H.C.; Steiner, J.A.; Sutcliffe, J.S.; Blakely, R.D. Enhanced activity of human serotonin transporter variants associated with autism. Philos. Trans. R Soc. London Ser. B Biol. Sci. 2009 , 364 , 163–173. [ Google Scholar ] [ CrossRef ] [ PubMed ]
• Sutcliffe, J.S.; Delahanty, R.J.; Prasad, H.C.; McCauley, J.L.; Han, Q.; Jiang, L.; Li, C.; Folstein, S.E.; Blakely, R.D. Allelic heterogeneity at the serotonin transporter locus (SLC6A4) confers susceptibility to autism and rigid-compulsive behaviors. Am. J. Hum. Genet. 2005 , 77 , 265–279. [ Google Scholar ] [ CrossRef ]
• Wendland, J.R.; Moya, P.R.; Kruse, M.R.; Ren-Patterson, R.F.; Jensen, C.L.; Timpano, K.R.; Murphy, D.L. A novel, putative gain-of-function haplotype at SLC6A4 associates with obsessive-compulsive disorder. Hum. Mol. Genet. 2008 , 17 , 717–723. [ Google Scholar ] [ CrossRef ]
• Ozaki, N.; Goldman, D.; Kaye, W.H.; Plotnicov, K.; Greenberg, B.D.; Lappalainen, J.; Rudnick, G.; Murphy, D.L. Serotonin transporter missense mutation associated with a complex neuropsychiatric phenotype. Mol. Psychiatry 2003 , 8 , 933–936. [ Google Scholar ] [ CrossRef ] [ PubMed ]
• Rasmussen, T.N.; Plenge, P.; Bay, T.; Egebjerg, J.; Gether, U. A single nucleotide polymorphism in the human serotonin transporter introduces a new site for N-linked glycosylation. Neuropharmacology 2009 , 57 , 287–294. [ Google Scholar ] [ CrossRef ] [ PubMed ]
• Mia, M.A.; Uddin, M.N.; Akter, Y.; Jesmin Wal Marzan, L. Exploring the Structural and Functional Effects of Nonsynonymous SNPs in the Human Serotonin Transporter Gene Through In Silico Approaches. Bioinform. Biol. Insights 2022 , 16 , 11779322221104308. [ Google Scholar ] [ CrossRef ] [ PubMed ]
• Murdoch, J.D.; Speed, W.C.; Pakstis, A.J.; Heffelfinger, C.E.; Kidd, K.K. Worldwide population variation and haplotype analysis at the serotonin transporter gene SLC6A4 and implications for association studies. Biol. Psychiatry 2013 , 74 , 879–889. [ Google Scholar ] [ CrossRef ]
• Lovejoy, E.A.; Scott, A.C.; Fiskerstrand, C.E.; Bubb, V.J.; Quinn, J.P. The serotonin transporter intronic VNTR enhancer correlated with a predisposition to affective disorders has distinct regulatory elements within the domain based on the primary DNA sequence of the repeat unit. Eur. J. Neurosci. 2003 , 17 , 417–420. [ Google Scholar ] [ CrossRef ] [ PubMed ]
• Voisey, J.; Swagell, C.D.; Hughes, I.P.; Lawford, B.R.; Young, R.M.D.; Morris, C.P. A novel SNP in COMT is associated with alcohol dependence but not opiate or nicotine dependence: A case control study. Behav. Brain Funct. 2011 , 7 , 51. [ Google Scholar ] [ CrossRef ]
• Boyd, S.J.; Schacht, J.P.; Prisciandaro, J.J.; Voronin, K.; Anton, R.F. Alcohol-Induced Stimulation Mediates the Effect of a GABRA2 SNP on Alcohol Self-Administrated among Alcohol-Dependent Individuals. Alcohol Alcohol. 2016 , 51 , 549–554. [ Google Scholar ] [ CrossRef ]
• Oo, K.Z.; Aung, Y.K.; Jenkins, M.A.; Win, A.K. Associations of 5HTTLPR polymorphism with major depressive disorder and alcohol dependence: A systematic review and meta-analysis. Aust. N. Z. J. Psychiatry 2016 , 50 , 842–857. [ Google Scholar ] [ CrossRef ]
• Haddley, K.; Bubb, V.J.; Breen, G.; Parades-Esquivel, U.M.; Quinn, J.P. Behavioural genetics of the serotonin transporter. Curr. Top. Behav. Neurosci. 2012 , 12 , 503–535. [ Google Scholar ] [ CrossRef ]
• Iurescia, S.; Seripa, D.; Rinaldi, M. Role of the 5-HTTLPR and SNP Promoter Polymorphisms on Serotonin Transporter Gene Expression: A Closer Look at Genetic Architecture and In Vitro Functional Studies of Common and Uncommon Allelic Variants. Mol. Neurobiol. 2016 , 53 , 5510–5526. [ Google Scholar ] [ CrossRef ]
• Wray, N.R.; James, M.R.; Gordon, S.D.; Dumenil, T.; Ryan, L.; Coventry, W.L.; Statham, D.J.; Pergadia, M.L.; Madden, P.A.; Heath, A.C.; et al. Accurate, Large-Scale Genotyping of 5HTTLPR and Flanking Single Nucleotide Polymorphisms in an Association Study of Depression, Anxiety, and Personality Measures. Biol. Psychiatry 2009 , 66 , 468–476. [ Google Scholar ] [ CrossRef ] [ PubMed ]
• Herold, C.; Becker, T. Genetic association analysis with FAMHAP: A major program update. Bioinformatics 2009 , 25 , 134–136. [ Google Scholar ] [ CrossRef ] [ PubMed ]

Click here to enlarge figure

Share and Cite

Ferraguti, G.; Francati, S.; Codazzo, C.; Blaconà, G.; Testino, G.; Angeloni, A.; Fiore, M.; Ceccanti, M.; Lucarelli, M. DNA Sequence Variations Affecting Serotonin Transporter Transcriptional Regulation and Activity: Do They Impact Alcohol Addiction? Int. J. Mol. Sci. 2024 , 25 , 8089. https://doi.org/10.3390/ijms25158089

Ferraguti G, Francati S, Codazzo C, Blaconà G, Testino G, Angeloni A, Fiore M, Ceccanti M, Lucarelli M. DNA Sequence Variations Affecting Serotonin Transporter Transcriptional Regulation and Activity: Do They Impact Alcohol Addiction? International Journal of Molecular Sciences . 2024; 25(15):8089. https://doi.org/10.3390/ijms25158089

Ferraguti, Giampiero, Silvia Francati, Claudia Codazzo, Giovanna Blaconà, Giancarlo Testino, Antonio Angeloni, Marco Fiore, Mauro Ceccanti, and Marco Lucarelli. 2024. "DNA Sequence Variations Affecting Serotonin Transporter Transcriptional Regulation and Activity: Do They Impact Alcohol Addiction?" International Journal of Molecular Sciences 25, no. 15: 8089. https://doi.org/10.3390/ijms25158089

Article Metrics

Article access statistics, further information, mdpi initiatives, follow mdpi.

Subscribe to receive issue release notifications and newsletters from MDPI journals

Advertisement

Supported by

In JD Vance Country, an Addiction Scourge That Won’t Go Away

The Republican vice-presidential nominee has spoken often about drug-afflicted communities like the one he escaped. But those communities have tempered their expectations for his help.

• Share full article

By Robert Draper

Reporting from Pomeroy, Ohio

Sitting in a KFC restaurant in the former coal-mining town of Pomeroy, Ohio, a few hours before JD Vance addressed the Republican National Convention, Curtis Ramsey, 18, recalled the first time he heard the Ohio senator’s name.

It was last month, he said, in the Washington office of another Ohio Republican, Representative Jim Jordan.

Mr. Ramsey, who had never been to a big city or flown on an airplane before, was in the capital with two filmmakers seeking to draw attention to a new documentary, “Inheritance.” The film features Mr. Ramsey and examines the plight of drug-ravaged Appalachian communities like his own.

When the filmmakers, Matt Moyer and his wife, Amy Toensing, explained to Mr. Jordan what their documentary was about, the congressman broke into a smile. “Sounds like the story of the next vice president of the United States!” Mr. Jordan said.

Recalling this encounter, Mr. Ramsey bit into his chicken sandwich and considered the supernova trajectory of the “Hillbilly Elegy” author against his own precarious life.

“He was lucky,” Mr. Ramsey said of Mr. Vance, an Ohioan who spent time in his early years 165 miles southwest of Pomeroy in Jackson, Ky. “He got out.”

We are having trouble retrieving the article content.

Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.

Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and  log into  your Times account, or  subscribe  for all of The Times.

Thank you for your patience while we verify access.

Already a subscriber?  Log in .

Want all of The Times?  Subscribe .

Academia.edu no longer supports Internet Explorer.

To browse Academia.edu and the wider internet faster and more securely, please take a few seconds to  upgrade your browser .

Enter the email address you signed up with and we'll email you a reset link.

• We're Hiring!
• Help Center

Land use changes in the environs of Moscow

Related Papers

Eurasian Geography and Economics

Grigory Ioffe

komal choudhary

This study illustrates the spatio-temporal dynamics of urban growth and land use changes in Samara city, Russia from 1975 to 2015. Landsat satellite imageries of five different time periods from 1975 to 2015 were acquired and quantify the changes with the help of ArcGIS 10.1 Software. By applying classification methods to the satellite images four main types of land use were extracted: water, built-up, forest and grassland. Then, the area coverage for all the land use types at different points in time were measured and coupled with population data. The results demonstrate that, over the entire study period, population was increased from 1146 thousand people to 1244 thousand from 1975 to 1990 but later on first reduce and then increase again, now 1173 thousand population. Builtup area is also change according to population. The present study revealed an increase in built-up by 37.01% from 1975 to 1995, than reduce -88.83% till 2005 and an increase by 39.16% from 2005 to 2015, along w...

Elena Milanova

Land use/Cover Change in Russia within the context of global challenges. The paper presents the results of a research project on Land Use/Cover Change (LUCC) in Russia in relations with global problems (climate change, environment and biodiversity degradation). The research was carried out at the Faculty of Geography, Moscow State University on the basis of the combination of remote sensing and in-field data of different spatial and temporal resolution. The original methodology of present-day landscape interpretation for land cover change study has been used. In Russia the major driver of land use/land cover change is agriculture. About twenty years ago the reforms of Russian agriculture were started. Agricultural lands in many regions were dramatically impacted by changed management practices, resulted in accelerated erosion and reduced biodiversity. Between the natural factors that shape agriculture in Russia, climate is the most important one. The study of long-term and short-ter...

Annals of The Association of American Geographers

Land use and land cover change is a complex process, driven by both natural and anthropogenic transformations (Fig. 1). In Russia, the major driver of land use / land cover change is agriculture. It has taken centuries of farming to create the existing spatial distribution of agricultural lands. Modernization of Russian agriculture started fifteen years ago. It has brought little change in land cover, except in the regions with marginal agriculture, where many fields were abandoned. However, in some regions, agricultural lands were dramatically impacted by changed management practices, resulting in accelerating erosion and reduced biodiversity. In other regions, federal support and private investments in the agricultural sector, especially those made by major oil and financial companies, has resulted in a certain land recovery. Between the natural factors that shape the agriculture in Russia, climate is the most important one. In the North European and most of the Asian part of the ...

Ekonomika poljoprivrede

Vasilii Erokhin

Journal of Rural Studies

judith pallot

In recent decades, Russia has experienced substantial transformations in agricultural land tenure. Post-Soviet reforms have shaped land distribution patterns but the impacts of these on agricultural use of land remain under-investigated. On a regional scale, there is still a knowledge gap in terms of knowing to what extent the variations in the compositions of agricultural land funds may be explained by changes in the acreage of other land categories. Using a case analysis of 82 of Russia’s territories from 2010 to 2018, the authors attempted to study the structural variations by picturing the compositions of regional land funds and mapping agricultural land distributions based on ranking “land activity”. Correlation analysis of centered log-ratio transformed compositional data revealed that in agriculture-oriented regions, the proportion of cropland was depressed by agriculture-to-urban and agriculture-to-industry land loss. In urbanized territories, the compositions of agricultura...

Open Geosciences

Alexey Naumov

Despite harsh climate, agriculture on the northern margins of Russia still remains the backbone of food security. Historically, in both regions studied in this article – the Republic of Karelia and the Republic of Sakha (Yakutia) – agricultural activities as dairy farming and even cropping were well adapted to local conditions including traditional activities such as horse breeding typical for Yakutia. Using three different sources of information – official statistics, expert interviews, and field observations – allowed us to draw a conclusion that there are both similarities and differences in agricultural development and land use of these two studied regions. The differences arise from agro-climate conditions, settlement history, specialization, and spatial pattern of economy. In both regions, farming is concentrated within the areas with most suitable natural conditions. Yet, even there, agricultural land use is shrinking, especially in Karelia. Both regions are prone to being af...

Loading Preview

Sorry, preview is currently unavailable. You can download the paper by clicking the button above.

RELATED TOPICS

•   We're Hiring!
•   Help Center
• Find new research papers in:
• Health Sciences
• Earth Sciences
• Cognitive Science
• Mathematics
• Computer Science
• Academia ©2024

Teenage Drug Abuse in the United States Essay

• To find inspiration for your paper and overcome writer’s block
• As a source of information (ensure proper referencing)
• As a template for you assignment

Social and health issues that take part during the formation of human identity have negative consequences on the individual’s further development. Thus, teenage drug abuse presents a severe danger to an individual’s health in adulthood. The problem of teenage drug abuse inflicts a threat to the future society and health state of the overall population in the United States. This essay will discuss the core reasons and consequences of teenage drug abuse and propose a possible solution based on the collected information.

There are several reasons for teenage drug abuse in the United States. As teenagers are influenced by high concertation of hormones, some of the core reasons for teenage drug abuse are specific to the age category, implying that those reasons are not connected to adult drug abuse. Moreover, teenagers are more influenced by external factors such as social connections and media. One of the core reasons for teenage drug abuse is the willingness to be accepted and validated in a social circle of individuals who already use drugs. In teenagers’ perception, drugs are often used in media as an attribute of cool characters, so they frequently try to fit in with the cool image, unaware of the consequences of drug use. In addition, current teenagers often experience depression and helplessness from being unable to control their lives or social rejection from excessive social media involvement and resort to drug abuse to feel better.

The consequences of teenage drug abuse include development and widespread poor morals, increased danger from sexual activity-related problems, such as STDs and unplanned pregnancy, dangerous driving, and poor performance in school. Even though some minor consequences of episodic drug abuse could be solved, threats like impaired driving present a significant danger to the population. Development and widespread of poor morals will also negatively affect the development of society as poor morals suggest an increased number of crime commitments among adolescents. With the current issues in the prison system, such as difficulties in offenders’ re-entry into the society, the teenagers’ future will be negatively affected in cases of crime commission.

Despite the complex character of the issues imposed by teenage drug abuse, one primary measure could solve the issue or partially improve the current state. The significant difference between teenage drug abuse and drug abuse among adults is parental participation in teenagers’ lives. Increasing the level of parental awareness on the issue of teenage drug abuse and providing them with necessary information could positively influence the situation. Providing parents with helpful information such as red flags in teenager’s behavior, and current state of drug involvement in the local area/school would help the parents establish connection with the teenager. The connection will provide an opportunity for a dialogue on the topic of drug use and its consequences. Moreover, active parental participation in teenagers’ activities would help prevent other issues, such as dangerous and harmful connections or violent tendencies.

In conclusion, this essay explored the issue of teenage drug abuse in the United States through the aspects of core reasons and consequences. Based on the collected information, teenagers are more subjected to drug abuse due to their social interactions and the high risk of depression tendencies. The increased parental participation in teenagers’ lives is the primary solution to the problem. Parents should express concerns about the child’s social circle and activities outside the home. Increasing parental awareness on the problem and providing opportunities for parent-teenager dialogue on the issue of drug abuse will positively influence the current state of teenage drug abuse in the United States.

• Healthy People 2020 and Tobacco Use
• History and Social Side of Drug Addiction
• Teenage Pregnancy in the Modern World
• Drug and Alcohol Abuse Among Teenagers
• Teenage Suicide: Statistics Data, Reasons and Prevention
• Explaining Drug Use: Social Scientific Theories
• Drug and Substance Addiction
• My Personal Beliefs About People With Addictions
• Alcoholics Anonymous Program Evaluation
• Drug-Related Individual Situation and Treatment Method
• Chicago (A-D)
• Chicago (N-B)

IvyPanda. (2022, November 25). Teenage Drug Abuse in the United States. https://ivypanda.com/essays/teenage-drug-abuse-in-the-united-states/

"Teenage Drug Abuse in the United States." IvyPanda , 25 Nov. 2022, ivypanda.com/essays/teenage-drug-abuse-in-the-united-states/.

IvyPanda . (2022) 'Teenage Drug Abuse in the United States'. 25 November.

IvyPanda . 2022. "Teenage Drug Abuse in the United States." November 25, 2022. https://ivypanda.com/essays/teenage-drug-abuse-in-the-united-states/.

1. IvyPanda . "Teenage Drug Abuse in the United States." November 25, 2022. https://ivypanda.com/essays/teenage-drug-abuse-in-the-united-states/.

Bibliography

IvyPanda . "Teenage Drug Abuse in the United States." November 25, 2022. https://ivypanda.com/essays/teenage-drug-abuse-in-the-united-states/.

Serial Killer Quick Reference Guides

#1 Stranglers

• Killer.Cloud
• Serial Killers
• Necrophiliacs

Sergei Ryakhovsky

The balashikha ripper, the hippopotamus,   active for 6 years (1988-1993) in russia, confirmed victims, possible victims.

• Serial Killer Profile
• Serial Killer Type
• General Information
• Characteristics
• Cognitive Ability
• Incarceration
• 8 Timeline Events
• Serial Killers Active During Spree
• Boolean Statistical Questions
• 12 Books Written About Sergei Ryakhovsky
• 3 External References

Internal References

Sergei Ryakhovsky (Sergei Vasilyevich Ryakhovsky) a Soviet-Russian serial killer known as the Balashikha Ripper and The Hippopotamus. Ryakhovsky was convicted for the killing of nineteen people in the Moscow area between 1988 and 1993. Ryakhovsky's mainly stabbed or strangulated his victims, he mutilated some bodies, mainly in the genital area. Allegedly Ryakhovsky carried out necrophilic acts on his victims and stole their belongings. Ryakhovsky standing 6’5" tall and weighting 286 pounds, gaining him the nickname, The Hippo. Sergei Ryakhovsky died on January 21st 2005 from untreated tuberculosis while serving his life sentence in prison.

Sergei Ryakhovsky Serial Killer Profile

Serial Killer Sergei Ryakhovsky (aka) the Balashikha Ripper, The Hippopotamus, was active for 6 years between 1988-1993 , known to have ( 19 confirmed / 19 possible ) victims. This serial killer was active in the following countries: Russia

Sergei Ryakhovsky was born on December 29th 1962 in Balashikha, Moscow Oblast, Soviet Union. He had a physically defect. During his education he had academic, social or discipline problems including being teased or picked on.

Sergei Ryakhovsky a necrophile male citizen of Russia.

Prior to his spree he had killed, commited crimes, and served time in jail.

In 1988 (Age 25/26) Sergei Ryakhovsky started his killing spree, during his crimes as a serial killer he was known to rob, commit acts of necrophilia , torture , strangle , rape , mutilate, and murder his victims.

He was arrested on April 13th 1993 (Age 30), sentenced to death by firing squad at a maximum-security penal colony in Solikamsk, Perm Oblast, Russia. He was convicted on charges of murder and other possible charges during his lifetime.

Sergei Ryakhovsky died on January 21st 2005 (Age 42), cause of death: natural causes, untreated tuberculosis at a maximum-security penal colony in Solikamsk, Perm Oblast, Russia.

Profile Completeness: 62%

Sergei Ryakhovsky has been listed on Killer.Cloud since November of 2016 and was last updated 5 years ago.

Sergei Ryakhovsky a known:

( 651 killers ) serial killer.

The unlawful killing of two or more victims by the same offender(s), in separate events. Serial Killer as defined by the FBI at the 2005 symposium.

( 308 killers ) RAPIST

Rape is usually defined as having sexual intercourse with a person who does not want to, or cannot consent.

( 60 killers ) NECROPHILIAC

Necrophilia, also called thanatophilia, is a sexual attraction or sexual act involving corpses. Serial Killer Necrophiliacs have been known to have sex with the body of their victim(s).

( 89 killers ) TORTURER

Torture is when someone puts another person in pain. This pain may be physical or psychological. Tourturers touture their victims.

( 251 killers ) STRANGLER

Strangulation is death by compressing the neck until the supply of oxygen is cut off. Stranglers kill by Strangulation.

Sergei Ryakhovsky Serial Killer Profile:

Updated: 2019-06-30 collected by killer.cloud.

8 Timeline Events of Serial Killer Sergei Ryakhovsky

The 8 dates listed below represent a timeline of the life and crimes of serial killer Sergei Ryakhovsky. A complete collection of serial killer events can be found on our Serial Killer Timeline .

Back to top Serial Killers Active During

The following serial killers were active during the same time span as Sergei Ryakhovsky (1988-1993).

Volker Eckert 9 Victims during 33 Years

Dorothea helen puente 9 victims during 7 years, harold shipman 15 victims during 28 years, james edward wood 1 victims during 18 years, serial killers by active year.

Books that Mention Sergei Ryakhovsky

Kevin Smith

Serial killer stranglers.

Serial Killer Rapists

Sergey Kuznetsov

Butterfly skin.

Geraldine Fagan

Believing in russia.

Danny Schäfer

Freedom of religion or belief. anti-sect move....

100 of the Most Famous Serial Killers of All...

Stanley M. Burgess

The new international dictionary of pentecost....

External References

• Sergei Ryakhovsky on en.wikipedia.org , Retrieved on Sep 18, 2018 .
• Juan Ignacio Blanco , Sergei Vasilyevich RYAKHOVSKY on murderpedia.org , Retrieved on Sep 18, 2018 .
• Q372816 on www.wikidata.org , Retrieved on Oct 9, 2018 .

Sergei Ryakhovsky is included in the following pages on Killer.Cloud the Serial Killer Database

• #3 of 45[ Page 1 ] of Serial Killers with birthdays in December
• #10 of 60[ Page 1 ] of Serial Killer Necrophiliacs sorted by Confirmed Victims
• #10 of 29[ Page 1 ] of Serial Killers active in Russia
• #10 of 55[ Page 1 ] of Capricorn Serial Killers sorted by Confirmed Victims
• #11 of 89[ Page 1 ] of Serial Killer Torturers sorted by Confirmed Victims
• #27 of 250[ Page 2 ] of Serial Killer Stranglers sorted by Confirmed Victims
• #35 of 307[ Page 3 ] of Serial Killer Rapist sorted by Confirmed Victims
• #63 of 651[ Page 5 ] of serial killers sorted by Confirmed Victims
• #264 of 651[ Page 18 ] of serial killers sorted by Years Active
• #381 of 651[ Page 26 ] of serial killers sorted by Profile Completeness
• #516 of 651[ Page 35 ] of the A-Z List of Serial Killers