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Let's Help Youth Stay Drug Free, Part III, Parents: The First Line of Defense in Prevention

NCJ Number
181148
Date Published
1999
Length
0 pages
Annotation
In this video, a five-member panel of persons experienced in working with programs designed to prevent youth drug abuse discusses ways in which parents can prevent their own children from abusing drugs and participate in community programs designed to impact youth drug use in general.
Abstract
A review of the family-based risk factors and protective factors that facilitate or prevent drug abuse by children and youth is first provided in an overview lecture. Whereas juvenile drug abuse correlates with parental drug abuse, poor parent-child bonding, inconsistent parental discipline, and the absence of parental guidance, children who do not abuse drugs tend to come from families in which at least one parent is home before the child leaves for school and when the child comes home from school, consistent and strategic discipline is applied, and guidance by the parents regarding drug use is informed and ongoing. The panel discusses various programs that are designed to help parents exert informed and constructive influences on their children. Panel members note the importance of parents having networks and group sessions in which they discuss with other parents what is happening in the peer subculture of youth and ways in which parents can cooperate to exert a constructive and united influence on that subculture. The panel advises that alcohol and marijuana abuse are the main drug problems among youth. Various community-wide programs designed to address such abuse are described, and parents are urged to become involved in such programs in their communities. Phone-in questions are answered by the panel in the latter portion of the video.