JOURNAL OF DRUG EDUCATION最新文献

Research has indicated that early sexual intercourse in high school is associated with poor health outcomes such as unintentional pregnancy and sexually transmitted infections (STIs). What is lacking in the research is an understanding of the relationship between even earlier sexual initiation (i.e., before the age of 13) and alcohol, tobacco, and other drug (ATOD) use behaviors. As such, the purpose of this study was to assess whether sexual intercourse younger than 13 years of age was predictive of ATOD use among students currently in high school. Data was derived from the 2015 Youth Risk Behavior Survey (n = 15,624). This national study is conducted every odd year, and is a representative sample of high school students in the United States. Logistic regression was used to determine the relationship between sexual initiation younger than 13 years of age and current ATOD use among high school students. The results of this study found that early sexual initiation was predictive of current high school ATOD use with students who had initiated early sexual intercourse having significantly higher prevalence rates among all variables measured. The results of this study indicates health education regarding ATOD use, as well as sexual health education should be introduced to US student at an earlier age. These results indicate that continued education is needed in the pre-teen years to prevent early health risk behaviors in our youth.

This pilot proof-of-concept study examined the feasibility and acceptability of a Continuing Care mobile application (app) designed to meet the recovery and personal support needs of individuals under justice supervision who were receiving outpatient substance use disorder (SUD) treatment. The study included adults on probation or parole who were enrolled in an outpatient SUD treatment program (N = 15; 86.7% males). Participants were instructed to utilize the Continuing Care app daily for 4 weeks. At the end of the study, they completed a satisfaction questionnaire. Of the 15 participants enrolled in the study, 12 (80%) completed the Continuing Care app modules and the satisfaction questionnaire, and all of these participants indicated high levels of satisfaction with the app (on a scale of 1-10, Mean = 1.8, SD = 1.2). The Continuing Care app was well-utilized and perceived as valuable by this group of low-income, underserved, and hard-to-reach individuals. Further research is needed to refine app content and evaluate its ability to meaningfully enhance and extend the benefits of SUD treatment.

Vape shops specialize in the sales of e-cigarettes and other vaping products. In recent studies, young adults who use e-cigarettes have tended to identify with at-risk peer crowds. This is the first study to examine vape shop customers' clientele. Composed primarily of young adults and persons in early middle adulthood, we speculated that a relatively high prevalence of those who appeared to bystanders as radical/extreme (at-risk) customers would be identified as such at these shops. We recruited vape shops throughout Southern California (N = 44 shops), and trained teams of data collectors visited each of the consented vape shops, making note of 451 customers' appearance, including features such as manner of dress, presence of tattoos, and hairstyles. Customers were then coded as either belonging to a conventional, progressive, or radical/extreme crowd based on outward appearance. Of the customers observed, 223 (49%) were rated as appearing to be in the conventional crowd; 169 (38%) were rated as appearing to be in the progressive crowd, and only 59 (13%) were rated as appearing to be in the radical/extreme crowd. The conventional crowd tended to appear older. Clientele may reflect that more conventional young and early middle age adults are tempted to visit vape shops due to perceptions of greater acceptability or safety of e-cigarettes. E-cigarette mass media campaigns aimed at protecting potential vape shop customers from harm may need to depict more conservative-looking characters.

Many public health campaigns are designed to combat the opioid crisis in America. However, these campaigns are often ineffective or even counterproductive. To explore what contributes to the (in)effectiveness of these campaigns, an online experiment was conducted among a convenience sample of college students to test American young adults' reactions to four anti-prescription opioid campaign messages from local and national health organizations that vary in the presence of visual exemplars and statistical information. The study found that including a visual exemplar showing the negative consequences of misusing prescription opioids increased perceived susceptibility, psychological reactance, and perceived campaign effectiveness. The impacts of visual exemplars on psychological reactance and perceived campaign effectiveness were moderated by statistical information and (partially) explained by the believability of the campaigns.

The use of prescription opioids is a matter of concern among academics and practitioners, but there remains a lack of programming to target this issue. One program, This Is (Not) About Drugs (TINAD), is intended to address part of this need by altering youth perceptions of the risks associated prescription opioid misuse as well as heroin. This study presents results from a quasi-experimental evaluation of TINAD. Propensity score matching techniques were used to account for selection effects across treatment and comparison groups. Program participants demonstrated increases in understanding of the similarities between prescription opioids and heroin and the risks associated with prescription opioid misuse. While these results are promising, TINAD requires a more rigorous evaluation of its effectiveness.

The present study investigated the prevalence and co-occurrence of addictions to tobacco, alcohol, other drugs, food/eating, the internet, texting, video games, shopping, love, sex, exercise, work, and gambling among American Indian (AI) youth in California. As with previous work in other cultural groups, the most prevalent addictions were love, internet, and exercise, though prevalence and co-occurrence of these addictions were relatively high among AI youth. A negative life events measure was associated with all the addictions, suggesting that life stressors are associated with high rates of multiple types of addictions among AI youth. There is a need for more research to better understand the relations of life stressors with multiple addictions among AI youth as well as how to remediate these behaviors.

A systematic review explored the creation and maintenance of community coalitions as effective for alcohol and other drug (AOD) prevention in adolescence. Community coalitions influence the implementation of effective and sustainable community-based prevention via infrastructure supporting development, delivery, and assessment of human service issues. For this review, 1,435 articles were identified, most including insufficient detail on the purposes and activities of coalitions or focus on adolescents. Of the 16 studies included, few discussed comprehensive frameworks describing coalition formation and maintenance or measureable influences on adolescent AOD prevention outcomes. Therefore, we propose four organizing principles for building sustainable community coalitions for adolescent AOD prevention.

The purpose of this study was to develop, test, and use an instrument to measure the effectiveness of a community-based, mandated drug education intervention program, Youthful Offenders Program (YOP), targeting college students at risk. A total of N = 350 students voluntarily agreed to participate in an evaluation of program effectiveness using the Alcohol Use Disorders Identification Test (AUDIT) and a newly developed measure to compare changes in substance related behaviors over time. Results revealed sound psychometric structure for the new scale for use in program evaluation; results suggest that YOP significantly enhanced safety practices and reduced hazardous drinking and recidivism, but not avoidance of risky behaviors.

We used data from the 2014 National Youth Tobacco Survey to examine patterns of cigarette smoking behavior and tobacco use. In light of the recent upsurge in e-cigarette use, we modeled current use and future intentions to use vape products along with combustible cigarette smoking and other tobacco products (i.e., cigars, cigarillos, chew, snuff, and dip). Latent class analyses indicated four discrete classes of smokers including a nominally involved class with very modest levels of tobacco product use, a class blending e-cigarette and cigars, a class of youth who predominantly use combustible cigarettes, and a group reporting indiscriminate use of almost all tobacco products excluding chew. Tests of invariance in item response probabilities and latent class proportions showed little variation across race and gender, albeit a new class of combustible cigarette and e-cigarette users emerged when examined by grade. Members of the heavy smoking and tobacco use class were more likely to be male, White, and older. Predictors of class membership included expectancies (perceived benefits of use), perceived harm (risk), media exposure, tobacco dependence, and the desire to quit. Findings are discussed in terms of characterizing risk among already smoking youth and how actionable prevention measures can be incorporated into existing universal and indicated programs that target reducing tobacco use and smoking behaviors.

We report the results of a quasi-experimental evaluation of a mystery shopper intervention in Zacatecas and Guadalupe, Mexico. Underage youth attempted to purchase beer at 50 Modelorama stores and 32 Oxxo stores (intervention groups), and at 19 comparison convenience stores in March, July, and August 2018. After each attempt, intervention store operators were informed if a sale was made. Modelorama operators also received training and were warned that repeated sales to minors could jeopardize their franchise. Average sales rates to minors were 63.8% at Modeloramas, 86.5% at Oxxo stores, and 98.2% at comparison stores. The findings suggest that mystery shopper interventions with training, feedback to store operators, and sanctions after repeated sales to underage youth may reduce sales to minors in low- and middle-income countries.