{"id":2535,"date":"2024-12-29T01:43:38","date_gmt":"2024-12-29T01:43:38","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.tcysapc.org\/?p=2535"},"modified":"2024-12-29T01:43:38","modified_gmt":"2024-12-29T01:43:38","slug":"most-us-teens-are-abstaining-from-drinking-smoking-and-marijuana-survey-says","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.tcysapc.org\/?p=2535","title":{"rendered":"Most US teens are abstaining from drinking, smoking and marijuana, survey says"},"content":{"rendered":"
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\"\"AP \u2014<\/strong> Teen drug use hasn\u2019t rebounded from its drop<\/a> during the early years of the COVID-19 pandemic, according to the results from a large annual national survey.\u00a0 About two-thirds of 12th graders this year said they hadn\u2019t used alcohol, marijuana, cigarettes or e-cigarettes in the previous 30 days. That\u2019s the largest proportion abstaining since the annual survey started measuring abstinence in 2017.<\/p>\n

Among 10th graders, 80% said they hadn\u2019t used any of those substances recently, another record. Among 8th graders, 90% didn\u2019t use any of them, the same as was reported in the previous survey.\u00a0 The only significant increase occurred in nicotine pouches. About 6% of 12th graders saying they\u2019d used them in the previous year, up from about 3% in 2023.<\/p>\n

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Whether that has the makings of a new public health problem is unclear. The University of Michigan\u2019s Richard Miech, who leads the survey, said: \u201cIt\u2019s hard to know if we\u2019re seeing the start of something, or not.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

The federally funded Monitoring the Future survey has been operating since 1975. This year\u2019s findings are based on responses from about 24,000 students in grades 8, 10 and 12 in schools across the country. The survey is \u201cone of the best, if not the best\u201d source of national data for substance use by teens, said Noah Kreski, a Columbia University researcher who has studied teen drug use.<\/p>\n

Early in the pandemic, students across the country were told not to go to schools and to avoid parties or other gatherings. They were at home, under parents\u2019 supervision. Alcohol and drug use of all kinds dropped because experimentation tends to occur with friends, spurred by peer pressure, experts say.<\/p>\n

As lockdowns ended, \u201cI think everyone expected at least a partial rebound,\u201d Miech said. Even before the pandemic, there were longstanding declines in teen cigarette smoking, drinking and use of several types of drugs. Experts theorized that kids were staying home and communicating on smartphones rather than hanging out in groups, where they sometimes tried illicit substances.<\/p>\n

But marijuana use wasn\u2019t falling before the pandemic. And vaping was on the upswing. It was only during the pandemic that those two saw enduring declines, too.\u00a0 Some experts wonder if the pandemic lockdowns had a deeper influence.<\/p>\n

Miech noted that a lot of teens who experiment with e-cigarettes or drugs start in the 9th grade, sometimes because older adolescents are doing it. But the kids who were 9th graders during the lockdowns never picked up the habit, and never had the opportunity to turn into negative influencers of their younger classmates, he said.\u00a0 \u201cThe pandemic stopped the cycle of new kids coming in and being recruited to drug use,\u201d Miech said.<\/p>\n

Mental health may also be a factor. There were increased reports of depression and anxiety in kids after the pandemic began. Depression is often associated with substance use, but some people with depression and anxiety are very wary of messing with drugs, said Dr. Duncan Clark, a University of Pittsburgh psychiatrist who researches substance use in kids.<\/p>\n

\u201cSome teens with anxiety are worried about the effects of substances. They may also be socially inhibited and have less opportunity to use drugs,\u201d Clark said. \u201cIt\u2019s a complicated relationship.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

AP \u2014 Teen drug use hasn\u2019t rebounded from its drop during the early years of the COVID-19 pandemic, according to the results from a large annual national survey.\u00a0 About two-thirds of 12th graders this year said they hadn\u2019t used alcohol, … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2535","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"aioseo_notices":[],"aioseo_head":"\n\t\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t