Pubdate: Tue, 17 Dec 2002 Source: New York Times (NY) Copyright: 2002 The New York Times Company Contact: http://www.nytimes.com/ Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/298 Author: Fox Butterfield TEENAGE DRUG USE IS DROPPING, A STUDY FINDS Smoking, drinking and the use of illegal drugs among teenagers fell simultaneously this year for the first time, according to an annual survey conducted for the National Institute on Drug Abuse. The survey, known as Monitoring the Future, and carried out by the University of Michigan's Institute for Social Research, also found a drop in the use of Ecstasy, the club drug, after several recent years in which the drug had exploded in popularity among adolescents. "The fact that there are such broad declines in all forms of substance abuse is very encouraging," said Lloyd Johnston, a University of Michigan psychologist who led the study. But the use of heroin, cocaine and crack cocaine, drugs for which there has been far less of an organized campaign by the government or private groups to publicize their dangers in the past few years, held about even, according to the study. The survey tracks substance abuse among 8th, 10th and 12th graders, using a randomly selected sample of 44,000 students in 400 schools around the nation. It has been conducted since 1975 and is considered because of its methodology, the size of the sampling and the prestige of the institution conducting it the most reliable indicator of teenage substance abuse. Experts offered varied theories for the declines. Professor Johnston said that the across-the-board drop in smoking, drinking and drug use, which took place among all three grade levels, suggested that some large force was at work, perhaps the impact of the terrorist attacks on Sept. 11. "A decline in use already was under way for a number of substances, including cigarettes, inhalants, LSD and others," Professor Johnston said. "But the downturn in alcohol this year was striking and overall illicit drug use began to decline for the first time across the board," he said. "So, I think it quite possible that the tragedy of 9/11 had somewhat of a sobering effect on the country's young people." John Walters, director of the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy, agreed that Sept. 11 played a role in the decrease in teenage smoking, drinking and drug use. "Before 9/11 the world was a giant shopping mall for young people," Mr. Walters said. "Now they are taking things more seriously and paying attention to adult warnings about risks." But Dr. Glen Hanson, the acting director of the National Institute on Drug Abuse, said there was no scientific evidence of a Sept. 11 effect. The survey does not ask students why they do or do not use drugs. "It has not been studied," Dr. Hanson said. "You could make the opposite case =E2=80=94 that 9/11 made people more anxious and prone to substance abuse." Instead, Dr. Hanson said he believed the explanation for the overall drop lay in teenagers' increased perception of the risks involved in smoking, drinking and drug use with an increase in negative advertising on television and in other media, some of it paid for by the settlement of lawsuits with tobacco companies. "The one predictor that we have learned from studies that is reliable is perceived risk," Dr. Hanson said. "When teenagers perceive risk is going up, drug use starts down, and that's what the survey this year shows." One of the biggest declines occurred in smoking, with the proportion of teenagers who said that they had ever smoked cigarettes falling by 4 or 5 percentage points compared with 2001 in each of the three grades, 8th, 10th and 12th. Teenage smoking peaked in 1996 or 1997, depending on the grade level, as did the use of drugs, the survey said. The new survey found that among 8th graders, the proportion who have ever smoked has dropped by half since 1996, to 10.7 percent from 21 percent. "That is a very appreciable change in behavior," Professor Johnston said. Although the declines among 10th and 12th graders were not as sharp, Professor Johnston said he expects the gains to improve in the next few years simply as the current 8th graders move into upper grades. This is known as a "cohort effect," Professor Johnston said. It is the opposite, and better side of what happened in the early 1990's when an increase in teenage smoking began with 8th graders and then continued as they grew older, he said. Among the explanations for the decline in smoking, Professor Johnston said, were increasing prices, less tobacco advertising and more anti-smoking advertisements. In addition, he said, the survey found that teenagers have a less favorable view of smoking. Among 8th graders, 81 percent said they prefer to date nonsmokers, up from 71 percent in 1996. Among 12th graders, 72 percent said they prefer to date nonsmokers, up from 64 percent in 1996. With alcohol, the proportion of 8th graders who said they had consumed alcohol in the past year declined 3.2 percent, and 3.5 percent among 10th graders, the report said. Since the peak year, the proportion of 8th graders who said they have had a drink in the past year fell to 38.7 percent this year from 45.5 percent in 1996. With drugs, use of any drug other than marijuana in the past year dropped 2 percentage points among 8th graders, 2.1 percentage points among 10th graders and 0.7 percentage points among 12th graders. The rate for use of drugs other than marijuana among 8th graders is now one-third lower than it was in 1996, the recent peak year, the report said. And annual use is down about 15 percent among 10th graders since its 1996 peak. - --- MAP posted-by: Derek