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Student Survey Shows That Marijuana Use is Related to Perceptions of Harm and Disapproval, 1996

NCJ Number
166380
Journal
CESAR FAX Volume: 6 Issue: 14 Dated: (April 14, 1997) Pages: complete issue
Date Published
1996
Length
14 pages
Annotation
This paper reports data from the national Monitoring the Future student survey of marijuana use.
Abstract
Data from the 1996 Monitoring the Future survey show that, as disapproval and perceptions of harm of marijuana have decreased since the early 90s, use of marijuana among 12th-graders has increased. A likely cause of these trends is the fact that this most recent group of young people grew up in a period in which drug use rates were down substantially from what they had been 10 to 15 years earlier. This gave the youngsters less opportunity to learn from others' mistakes and resulted in generational forgetting of the hazards of drugs. Also, in recent years youngsters have heard less about the dangers of drugs from a number of sectors that have paid less attention to the issue, including parents, schools, and the media. Young people's use of illicit drugs other than marijuana also continued longer-term increases into 1996, although in general the increases have been much more gradual. Findings show that, when young people come to see a drug as more dangerous, or more disapproved by their peers, they are generally less likely to use it. Tables