Role of Psychopathology in Adolescent Problem Drug Use

描述（由申请人提供）：本提案寻求两年的支持，使用项目家庭的数据进行二次分析，该项目是一项性别平衡的小组研究，对1993年进入六年级的429名农村青少年及其家庭进行研究。在七年的时间里，对青少年和他们的父母进行了六次结构化的互动采访和观察。在社会发展模型和发展精神病理学的指导下，本研究将探讨行为问题和抑郁症状对整个青春期和18岁时药物使用的相对（加性）和相互作用。该研究还将研究青春期的社会发展过程在多大程度上介导精神病理学对物质使用和问题使用的影响。此外，假设关系中的性别差异将被测试，背景变量，如父母的精神病理，将包括在分析中。研究结果将通过阐明可用于早期识别需要选择性预防服务的高危个体的变量，以及通过确定调解精神病理和问题使用之间联系的可可塑性社会发展过程，为青少年药物滥用预防提供信息。

DESCRIPTION (provided by the applicant): This proposal seeks two years of support to conduct secondary analyses using data from Project Family, a gender-balanced panel study of 429 rural youths and their families constituted in 1993 when students entered the sixth grade. Adolescents and their parents were interviewed and observed in structured interactions on six occasions across seven years. Guided by the social development model and a developmental psychopathology perspective, this study will examine the relative (additive) and interactive effects of conduct problems and depressive symptoms on substance use throughout adolescence and on problem use at age 18. The study also will examine the extent to which social developmental processes during adolescence mediate the effects of psychopathology on substance use and problem use. Further, gender differences in the hypothesized relations will be tested, and background variables, such as parental psychopathology, will be included in the analyses. Findings from the study will inform drug abuse prevention for adolescents by elucidating variables that may be used for the early identification of at-risk individuals in need of selective prevention services, and by identifying malleable social developmental processes that mediate the link between psychopathology and problem use.