Teens Views on Smoking Linked to Likelihood of Consuming Alcohol and Drugs
Peer pressure, parental influence and the role they play in the use of multiple drugs was studied by researchers at Weil Cornell Medical College: the research seems to point out that teens’ views on tobacco use could have a link with the decision to use tobacco, alcohol, and marijuana together.
Among girls, friends are more influential. When friends in their inner circle were undecided or accommodating of tobacco use their likelihood of using a combination of these three were much higher. Among boys, the general opinion and practices of their whole age group were more influential than those of friends. The teen’s views on using these substances are most often dictated by how socially accepted they feel their use is among their peers. This slight difference in the way boys and girls make decisions could affect the way prevention should be brought up among teens.
This study was one of the first to focus on all three gateway drugs at once rather than apart and it could lead to prevention methods that treat all three as a group rather than individually. In this way smoking, marijuana and alcohol use could be reduced among teens by addressing the issue in a way that truly relates to the way they make these decisions. If the decision to smoke is one of the first things that can lead to use of the other two substances it should be addressed as a pathway to them.
Tags: Alcohol, drugs, peers, smoking, teens, tobacco
