Pr/chologicalReporh, 1991, 68, 363-367. O Psychological Reports 1991
DRUG USE A N D ITS RELATION T O H I G H S C H O O L STUDENTS' ACTIVITIES LISA M. LEWANDOWSKI AND ALIDA S. WESTMAN
'
Eastern Michigan Universiiy Summary.-In a high school in a suburb of Detroit, students' attitudes toward, use of, and money spent on drugs, as well as possible alternative activities, were investigated. The sample included 42 enrolled in alternative education designed for students at risk for drug abuse, pregnancy, etc., who might attend college if guided carefully, and 65 regular students who were a mix of college and noncollege bound. The two groups did not differ in actual drug use, most likely because those who recommended students to the alternative education program used low grade point average and not drug use as criterion. Very few "hard" drugs were used. Most frequently used were readily available drugs such as alcohol. Use of a drug, spending money on it, or believing that it is a l l right for adolescents to use the drug did not automatically indicate frequent use of the drug. Contrary to adults' expectations, "hangin' out" with peers decreased use of "soft" drugs. Family activities for some involved the use of hard drugs together or the condoning of use. To create effective drug-prevention programs, the effects of different activities need to be explored further, and admission criteria need to be well delineated.
School-based prevention of drug abuse is very popular. Such programs are requested in calls for grant proposals from the NationaI Institute on Drug Abuse. The President's war on drugs and TV specials suggest very heavy use of hard drugs. This study investigated which drugs are used, money spent on drugs, and attitudes toward drug use. We reasoned that spending money on drugs would be indicative of drug use. Students using drugs regularly would have the cost of maintaining a continuous supply. I n contrast, sporadic experimentation would require little or no money. Also, behavior has been related to attitude for alcohol use (Stolberg, 1988), so we hypothesized that drug users would be spending money on drugs and feel that it was all right for them and their peers to use drugs. Prevention programs for drug-abuse focus on factors such as social skills training, self-esteem, drug education, and communication skills. The programs vary in success and focus. The Alternatives Approach (Cook, Lawrence, Morse, & Roehl, 1984) views drug use as a way for adolescents to fulfill their needs and wants. It assumes that these needs and wants also can be 'Requests for reprints should be sent to Alida S. Westman, Department of Psychology, Eastern Michigan University, Ypsilanti, MI 48197. This research was the first author's Honors Thesis at Eastern Michigan University under the guidance of Alida S. Westman. We thank Dr. J. Knapp, Eastern Michigan University, for his help with the rinci al component analyses and Dr. N. Gordon, Eastern Michigan University, for his criticaffeedgack. We also thank the counselors, teachers, and students of the suburban high school of Detroit who participated. They remain anonymous at the principal's request.
364
L. M. LEWANDOWSKI
& A.
S. WESTMAN
met through satisfying nonchemical activities and focuses on providing nonchemical activities. We hypothesized that drug use would be more frequent in those unsatisfied by nondrug activities and that students enrolled in an alternative program following the Alternative Approach Model would use fewer drugs and have more positive attitudes toward being drug-free than students in the regular program at the same high school.
Subjects High school students in a suburb of Detroit participated. They were predominantly whlte, middle-middle to upper-middle socioeconomic class. From the alternative program, 16 boys (mean age of 16.4 yr., SD of 1.0) and 26 girls (mean age of 16.4 yr., SD of 0.9) agreed to participate. The control group consisted of 42 boys (mean age of 16 yr., SD of 1.3) and 23 girls (mean age of 15.7 yr., SD of 1.4) enrolled in classes selected to guarantee a mix of college and noncollege bound students.
Materia Is A questionnaire was used to collect background information about sex, age and parental education, and four activity checkhsts were used to explore which activities students engaged in with their family/guardian(s), with their peers, by themselves, or at school. Also, students were asked which other activities they wanted to do and reasons for not doing them. The last part included two checklists, one on activities and items on which adolescents spent their money and how important it was to them to spend this money. The other was a drug list using all the common terms the students used and asked whether the student had used the drug, how frequently, and whether it was OK for kids to use this drug. In each activity list and checklist was a space to add "other." The questionnaire and checklists used were tailored to our hypotheses. They had face valtdity. Test-retest reliability with a week between sessions was very good. For example, of the 204 ratings concerning activities with peers, 79% had reliabilities of .90 or better, 8 % were between .80 and .89, and 5 % between .70 and .79. Similarly, all of the ratings dealing with drug use had a reliability of .94 or higher.
Procedure The questionnaires were given by the first author, took about 35 to 40 minutes to complete and were filled in during regular 50-min. class periods at the high school. No other adult was in the room as the questionnaires 'The checklists, means and standard deviations, and principal components analyses are available in Document NAPS-04855 From Microfiche Publications, POB 3513, Grand Central Station, New York, NY 10163. For photocopy remit $7.75; for fiche $4.00.
365
DRUGS AND YOUTHS' ACTIVITIES
were introduced, and the students were told that honesty was necessary for taking the questionnaire. If they did not want to take the questionnaire or felt that they could not be honest, they could leave the questionnaire blank and do any quiet alternative activity, such as listening to their Walkman radios or doing homework. The questionnaires were totally anonymous and students were not compensated for completing them. The first author is a former graduate of the high school, a mentor for teenagers in the community, and close in age to the students. The students seemed relaxed and openly shared their thoughts about drug issues with her. All students filled out the questionnaires, but seven had to be eliminated because five students came in late and did not finish, and two did not follow instructions.
RESULTSAND DISCUSSION For each student, data included (1) the person's age, sex, and parents' education, (2) activities engaged in with family/guardians, with peers, alone, and at school, (3) activities adolescents wanted to do and reasons for not doing so, (4) things he spent money on and the importance of this spending, ( 5 ) use, frequency of use, and attitude toward the use of drugs. The regularly enrolled and alternative program students were compared using t tests. Pearson product-moment correlation coefficients between the dependent variables were calculated, and principal component analyses were performed using BMDP4M (Dixon, 1988) which sorted the variables using statistically significant correlations only. Loadings less than ,2500 were replaced by zero. TABLE 1 PEARSON CORRELATIONS BETWEENSPENDING MONEYO N AND USE OF THE DRUG AND MEANFREQUENCY OF USE BY THOSESPENDING MONEYON THE DRUG Drug
r
Barbiturates Cocaine Caffeine Freon Glue LSD Nitrous Oxide
.358t .258t .316t
.412t .241t .377t .351t
Mean Frequency less less less less less less less
than than than than than than than
once once once once once once once
a month a month
a month a month a month a month a month
Hypothesis 1 indicated that drug users would be expected to spend some of their money on drugs and feel that it was OK for them and their peers to use the drugs. This hypothesis was supported, see Tables 1 and 2. In addition, those who used drugs did not necessarily use them frequently. Use then did not indicate dependency on the drug. This needs to be remembered when deciding whether special treatment is necessary. The drugs used seemed to be the ones adolescents could obtain easily at
366
L. M. LEWANDOWSKI & A. S. WESTMAN
home, in school, or at the store. Usually money was not spent on alcohol, codeine, marijuana, or paint. Further interviews indicated that these drugs were frequently obtained from home. Furthermore, "hard" drugs were rarely used. None of these students had used heroin or "ice" in the past year. Less than 2% of the sample had used crack, methadone, or "ecstasy," and less than 6% had used PCP, psilocybin, mescaline, or morphine. TABLE 2 PEARSON CORRELATIONS BETWEENTHE AT~TLJDETHATIT IS O K FORADOLESCENTSTO USE A DRUGAND USE OR FREQUENCY OF USE OF THE DRUGw THE PASTYEAR, AND &AN FREQUENCY OF DRUGUSE BY THOSE WHOCONDONE ITS USE BY ADOLESCENTS Drug
Attitude Attitude and and Drug Use, Frequency, 7
Alcohol Caffeine Codeine Freon Glue Marijuana Nitrous Oxide Paint
7
M Frequency of Use by Those Condoning the use by Adolescents less than once a week less than once a month 1-3 times a month less than once a month less than once a month less than once a week less than once a month 1-12 times a year
Hypothesis 2 indicated that students in the alternative program would use fewer drugs and have more positive attitudes toward being drug-free than the control group. This hypothesis was not supported. There was no difference in attitude (t< 1.99, p>.05), drug use (t .05), or frequency of drug use ( t < 1.99, p>.05). Of course, the alternative program might be successful in suppressing what would otherwise be a higher rate of drug use. However, follow-up interviews with authorities who referred students suggested that the selection process was not based on drug use but rather on low grade point average. In fact, not aU authorities who referred students indicated that suspicion of drug use would lead them to recommend admission to the program. Therefore, the failure to find a difference in drug use or in drug attitudes between the groups was probably related to the selection process rather than the program. We also hypothesized that there would be a relationship between drug use and desires not satisfied by nondrug activities. Some activities did deter drug use as suggested by the Alternative Activity Approach (Cook, 1985; Cook, et al., 1984). Specifically, those who spent more time with school sports (factor loading -.26) were less likely to have used barbiturates, PCP psilocybin, butyl nitrite, nitrous oxide (loadings between .56 and .77), marijuana, LSD, and cocaine (loadings between .33 and .38) in the past year.
DRUGS AND YOUTHS' ACTIVITIES
367
Similarly, those who spent more time "hangin' out" with friends in places like parks and local parking lots (factor loading .26) used alcohol, marijuana (loading of .74 and .72), paint, and butyl nitrite (loading of .42 and .31) less frequently than those spending less time "hanging' out" with their friends. This was surprising because this activity is frequently believed by adults to increase drug use. Therefore, the effect of an activity depends more on how it is perceived by the adolescent than by adults. Family involvement did not necessarily deter drug use. Principal components analysis yielded two distinct subgroups. In one group, if adolescents spent more time in activities with their families (factor loading -.3O), they were less likely to have tried one or more drugs (loading .82), and if they did use drugs they were more likely to use alcohol, marijuana (loading of .72 and .70), paint, and nitrous oxide (loading of .36 and .28), that is "softer" drugs. These adolescents also found activities with friends were more enjoyable (loading .29). In another group, if adolescents spent more time in activities with their families (factor loading -.29), they were more likely to use butyl nitrite (loading .74), barbiturates, mescaline, and PCP (loadings between .28 and .48), that is, "hard" drugs. Use of drugs was part of what these families engaged in or at least condoned. When adolescents were asked to express what they would like to do instead of their current activities, 63% expressed a desire to participate in something different. Of these, 49% desired more interpersonal or social activities and 14% wanted more sports. A program of alternative activities should include activities adolescents find fulfilling and persons with whom they want to do them. It cannot be assumed automatically that activities with families are wholesome or that activities with peers are supportive of drug use. Furthermore, given the social orientation of adolescents, who else is available to do the activities is very important. It may be more important to improve adolescents' interpersonal relationships withn their current activities than to provide new alternatives. REFERENCES model and guidelines COOK,R. (1985) The alternatives approach revisited: a bi~ps~chological for application. The InfernationalJournal of the Addictions, 20, 1399-1419. COOK,R., LAWRENCE,H., MORSE,C., & ROEHL,J. (1984) Evaluation of the alternatives approach to drug abuse prevention. The International Journal of the Addictions, 19, 767787.
D ~ O NW. , J. (Ed.) (1988) BMDP Statistical Software manual. Berkeley, CA: Univer. of California Press. STOLBERG,V. B. (1988) Examination of the Alcohol Knowledge-Attitudes-Behavior Model with Incoming College Students. Journal of Alcohol and Drug Abuse, 34, 45-47. Accepted March 18, 199 1
DRUG USE A N D ITS RELATION T O H I G H S C H O O L STUDENTS' ACTIVITIES LISA M. LEWANDOWSKI AND ALIDA S. WESTMAN
'
Eastern Michigan Universiiy Summary.-In a high school in a suburb of Detroit, students' attitudes toward, use of, and money spent on drugs, as well as possible alternative activities, were investigated. The sample included 42 enrolled in alternative education designed for students at risk for drug abuse, pregnancy, etc., who might attend college if guided carefully, and 65 regular students who were a mix of college and noncollege bound. The two groups did not differ in actual drug use, most likely because those who recommended students to the alternative education program used low grade point average and not drug use as criterion. Very few "hard" drugs were used. Most frequently used were readily available drugs such as alcohol. Use of a drug, spending money on it, or believing that it is a l l right for adolescents to use the drug did not automatically indicate frequent use of the drug. Contrary to adults' expectations, "hangin' out" with peers decreased use of "soft" drugs. Family activities for some involved the use of hard drugs together or the condoning of use. To create effective drug-prevention programs, the effects of different activities need to be explored further, and admission criteria need to be well delineated.
School-based prevention of drug abuse is very popular. Such programs are requested in calls for grant proposals from the NationaI Institute on Drug Abuse. The President's war on drugs and TV specials suggest very heavy use of hard drugs. This study investigated which drugs are used, money spent on drugs, and attitudes toward drug use. We reasoned that spending money on drugs would be indicative of drug use. Students using drugs regularly would have the cost of maintaining a continuous supply. I n contrast, sporadic experimentation would require little or no money. Also, behavior has been related to attitude for alcohol use (Stolberg, 1988), so we hypothesized that drug users would be spending money on drugs and feel that it was all right for them and their peers to use drugs. Prevention programs for drug-abuse focus on factors such as social skills training, self-esteem, drug education, and communication skills. The programs vary in success and focus. The Alternatives Approach (Cook, Lawrence, Morse, & Roehl, 1984) views drug use as a way for adolescents to fulfill their needs and wants. It assumes that these needs and wants also can be 'Requests for reprints should be sent to Alida S. Westman, Department of Psychology, Eastern Michigan University, Ypsilanti, MI 48197. This research was the first author's Honors Thesis at Eastern Michigan University under the guidance of Alida S. Westman. We thank Dr. J. Knapp, Eastern Michigan University, for his help with the rinci al component analyses and Dr. N. Gordon, Eastern Michigan University, for his criticaffeedgack. We also thank the counselors, teachers, and students of the suburban high school of Detroit who participated. They remain anonymous at the principal's request.
364
L. M. LEWANDOWSKI
& A.
S. WESTMAN
met through satisfying nonchemical activities and focuses on providing nonchemical activities. We hypothesized that drug use would be more frequent in those unsatisfied by nondrug activities and that students enrolled in an alternative program following the Alternative Approach Model would use fewer drugs and have more positive attitudes toward being drug-free than students in the regular program at the same high school.
Subjects High school students in a suburb of Detroit participated. They were predominantly whlte, middle-middle to upper-middle socioeconomic class. From the alternative program, 16 boys (mean age of 16.4 yr., SD of 1.0) and 26 girls (mean age of 16.4 yr., SD of 0.9) agreed to participate. The control group consisted of 42 boys (mean age of 16 yr., SD of 1.3) and 23 girls (mean age of 15.7 yr., SD of 1.4) enrolled in classes selected to guarantee a mix of college and noncollege bound students.
Materia Is A questionnaire was used to collect background information about sex, age and parental education, and four activity checkhsts were used to explore which activities students engaged in with their family/guardian(s), with their peers, by themselves, or at school. Also, students were asked which other activities they wanted to do and reasons for not doing them. The last part included two checklists, one on activities and items on which adolescents spent their money and how important it was to them to spend this money. The other was a drug list using all the common terms the students used and asked whether the student had used the drug, how frequently, and whether it was OK for kids to use this drug. In each activity list and checklist was a space to add "other." The questionnaire and checklists used were tailored to our hypotheses. They had face valtdity. Test-retest reliability with a week between sessions was very good. For example, of the 204 ratings concerning activities with peers, 79% had reliabilities of .90 or better, 8 % were between .80 and .89, and 5 % between .70 and .79. Similarly, all of the ratings dealing with drug use had a reliability of .94 or higher.
Procedure The questionnaires were given by the first author, took about 35 to 40 minutes to complete and were filled in during regular 50-min. class periods at the high school. No other adult was in the room as the questionnaires 'The checklists, means and standard deviations, and principal components analyses are available in Document NAPS-04855 From Microfiche Publications, POB 3513, Grand Central Station, New York, NY 10163. For photocopy remit $7.75; for fiche $4.00.
365
DRUGS AND YOUTHS' ACTIVITIES
were introduced, and the students were told that honesty was necessary for taking the questionnaire. If they did not want to take the questionnaire or felt that they could not be honest, they could leave the questionnaire blank and do any quiet alternative activity, such as listening to their Walkman radios or doing homework. The questionnaires were totally anonymous and students were not compensated for completing them. The first author is a former graduate of the high school, a mentor for teenagers in the community, and close in age to the students. The students seemed relaxed and openly shared their thoughts about drug issues with her. All students filled out the questionnaires, but seven had to be eliminated because five students came in late and did not finish, and two did not follow instructions.
RESULTSAND DISCUSSION For each student, data included (1) the person's age, sex, and parents' education, (2) activities engaged in with family/guardians, with peers, alone, and at school, (3) activities adolescents wanted to do and reasons for not doing so, (4) things he spent money on and the importance of this spending, ( 5 ) use, frequency of use, and attitude toward the use of drugs. The regularly enrolled and alternative program students were compared using t tests. Pearson product-moment correlation coefficients between the dependent variables were calculated, and principal component analyses were performed using BMDP4M (Dixon, 1988) which sorted the variables using statistically significant correlations only. Loadings less than ,2500 were replaced by zero. TABLE 1 PEARSON CORRELATIONS BETWEENSPENDING MONEYO N AND USE OF THE DRUG AND MEANFREQUENCY OF USE BY THOSESPENDING MONEYON THE DRUG Drug
r
Barbiturates Cocaine Caffeine Freon Glue LSD Nitrous Oxide
.358t .258t .316t
.412t .241t .377t .351t
Mean Frequency less less less less less less less
than than than than than than than
once once once once once once once
a month a month
a month a month a month a month a month
Hypothesis 1 indicated that drug users would be expected to spend some of their money on drugs and feel that it was OK for them and their peers to use the drugs. This hypothesis was supported, see Tables 1 and 2. In addition, those who used drugs did not necessarily use them frequently. Use then did not indicate dependency on the drug. This needs to be remembered when deciding whether special treatment is necessary. The drugs used seemed to be the ones adolescents could obtain easily at
366
L. M. LEWANDOWSKI & A. S. WESTMAN
home, in school, or at the store. Usually money was not spent on alcohol, codeine, marijuana, or paint. Further interviews indicated that these drugs were frequently obtained from home. Furthermore, "hard" drugs were rarely used. None of these students had used heroin or "ice" in the past year. Less than 2% of the sample had used crack, methadone, or "ecstasy," and less than 6% had used PCP, psilocybin, mescaline, or morphine. TABLE 2 PEARSON CORRELATIONS BETWEENTHE AT~TLJDETHATIT IS O K FORADOLESCENTSTO USE A DRUGAND USE OR FREQUENCY OF USE OF THE DRUGw THE PASTYEAR, AND &AN FREQUENCY OF DRUGUSE BY THOSE WHOCONDONE ITS USE BY ADOLESCENTS Drug
Attitude Attitude and and Drug Use, Frequency, 7
Alcohol Caffeine Codeine Freon Glue Marijuana Nitrous Oxide Paint
7
M Frequency of Use by Those Condoning the use by Adolescents less than once a week less than once a month 1-3 times a month less than once a month less than once a month less than once a week less than once a month 1-12 times a year
Hypothesis 2 indicated that students in the alternative program would use fewer drugs and have more positive attitudes toward being drug-free than the control group. This hypothesis was not supported. There was no difference in attitude (t< 1.99, p>.05), drug use (t .05), or frequency of drug use ( t < 1.99, p>.05). Of course, the alternative program might be successful in suppressing what would otherwise be a higher rate of drug use. However, follow-up interviews with authorities who referred students suggested that the selection process was not based on drug use but rather on low grade point average. In fact, not aU authorities who referred students indicated that suspicion of drug use would lead them to recommend admission to the program. Therefore, the failure to find a difference in drug use or in drug attitudes between the groups was probably related to the selection process rather than the program. We also hypothesized that there would be a relationship between drug use and desires not satisfied by nondrug activities. Some activities did deter drug use as suggested by the Alternative Activity Approach (Cook, 1985; Cook, et al., 1984). Specifically, those who spent more time with school sports (factor loading -.26) were less likely to have used barbiturates, PCP psilocybin, butyl nitrite, nitrous oxide (loadings between .56 and .77), marijuana, LSD, and cocaine (loadings between .33 and .38) in the past year.
DRUGS AND YOUTHS' ACTIVITIES
367
Similarly, those who spent more time "hangin' out" with friends in places like parks and local parking lots (factor loading .26) used alcohol, marijuana (loading of .74 and .72), paint, and butyl nitrite (loading of .42 and .31) less frequently than those spending less time "hanging' out" with their friends. This was surprising because this activity is frequently believed by adults to increase drug use. Therefore, the effect of an activity depends more on how it is perceived by the adolescent than by adults. Family involvement did not necessarily deter drug use. Principal components analysis yielded two distinct subgroups. In one group, if adolescents spent more time in activities with their families (factor loading -.3O), they were less likely to have tried one or more drugs (loading .82), and if they did use drugs they were more likely to use alcohol, marijuana (loading of .72 and .70), paint, and nitrous oxide (loading of .36 and .28), that is "softer" drugs. These adolescents also found activities with friends were more enjoyable (loading .29). In another group, if adolescents spent more time in activities with their families (factor loading -.29), they were more likely to use butyl nitrite (loading .74), barbiturates, mescaline, and PCP (loadings between .28 and .48), that is, "hard" drugs. Use of drugs was part of what these families engaged in or at least condoned. When adolescents were asked to express what they would like to do instead of their current activities, 63% expressed a desire to participate in something different. Of these, 49% desired more interpersonal or social activities and 14% wanted more sports. A program of alternative activities should include activities adolescents find fulfilling and persons with whom they want to do them. It cannot be assumed automatically that activities with families are wholesome or that activities with peers are supportive of drug use. Furthermore, given the social orientation of adolescents, who else is available to do the activities is very important. It may be more important to improve adolescents' interpersonal relationships withn their current activities than to provide new alternatives. REFERENCES model and guidelines COOK,R. (1985) The alternatives approach revisited: a bi~ps~chological for application. The InfernationalJournal of the Addictions, 20, 1399-1419. COOK,R., LAWRENCE,H., MORSE,C., & ROEHL,J. (1984) Evaluation of the alternatives approach to drug abuse prevention. The International Journal of the Addictions, 19, 767787.
D ~ O NW. , J. (Ed.) (1988) BMDP Statistical Software manual. Berkeley, CA: Univer. of California Press. STOLBERG,V. B. (1988) Examination of the Alcohol Knowledge-Attitudes-Behavior Model with Incoming College Students. Journal of Alcohol and Drug Abuse, 34, 45-47. Accepted March 18, 199 1
