For the last 33 years, the University of Michigan has conducted a survey called Monitoring the Future. It measures use of drug, alcohol and cigarettes among adolescents nationwide. It also measures the attitudes of our young people about those same items. Over forty-six thousand students from 386 public and private schools in grades 8, 10, and 12 participated in this year's survey. The survey is funded by the NIDA, a component of the National Institutes of Health (NIH), and conducted by the University of Michigan.
We are winning in some areas with our students and losing in others. There are still some suburban folks who think this is only about young people in inner city high schools, but according to this survey white middle class suburban parents are the ones who need to take notice.
If you are interested in looking at the whole report try this URL http://www.nida.nih.gov/newsroom/08/NR12-11.html.
First the good news about cigarette and alcohol trends, they continue to decline. The use of marijuana decline has started to level off (10.9 percent of eighth graders, 23.9 percent of tenth graders, and 32.4 percent of twelfth graders reporting past year use). The concern seems to be there is an increase of eighth graders who are proportionately starting to think about marijuana as not as bad.
Some bad news, the survey sees a continuing high rate of prescription drug use. There is little change in the past six years.
"Nearly 10 percent of seniors reported past year nonmedical use of Vicodin, and 4.7 percent report abusing Oxycontin, both powerful opioid painkillers. In fact, seven of the top 10 drugs abused by twelfth graders in the year prior to the survey were prescribed or purchased over-the-counter."
Good news:Cigarette smoking is at the lowest rate in the history of the MTF survey. "... there continues to be a gradual decline in alcohol use in all grades, with a significant decline from 2007 to 2008 among tenth graders on all measures of use (lifetime, past year, past month, daily, and binge drinking). Nevertheless, given the devastating related health costs, tobacco and alcohol use by teens still remain at high levels. More than one in ten high school seniors say they smoke daily; 5.4 percent smoke more than a half pack a day. While drinking continues a slow downward trend, close to 25 percent of seniors report having five or more drinks in a row sometime in the two weeks prior to the survey."
Bad news: Attitudes are shifting. Among 12th graders it seems that the LSD is not considered to be as much of a risk as it was before. Our teachings are losing its strength. The same is for the eighth graders. A shift of perception is softening about the harm that marijuana and inhalants can cause.
