Drug Use and Lifestyles of American Youth

描述(申请人提供)：本申请寻求监测未来(MTF)研究的五年延续，这是一个持续进行的流行病学和病原学研究和报告项目，始于1975年。除了是一项基础研究外，MTF还成为美国青少年、大学生和年轻人中关于药物使用趋势的最可靠的信息来源。每年将对8年级、11年级和12年级的学生(每个年级140所学校每年约16,000名学生)进行具有全国代表性的抽样调查。另一项单独的申请寻求继续对年龄在19-30岁、35岁、40岁、45岁和50岁的高中毕业生进行邮寄跟进。这项研究的队列顺序纵向设计允许测量和区分三种类型的变化--年龄(发展)、时期(历史)和队列。每种类型都有不同类别的决定因素，这项研究表明，这三种类型都发生在大多数药物中。将监测可能解释历史趋势和队列差异的因素。MTF的进一步目标是记录成年期吸毒和相关态度的自然历史，并确定有助于毒品使用和相关态度变化和稳定的个人和背景特征以及社会角色转变。这些目标中的许多目标可以使用现有的队列顺序数据来实现；但这些结果将扩展到新的年份、队列和年龄，并在这一应用程序和单独的后续应用程序下收集新的数据。这项研究将考察许多其他假想的毒品使用心理、行为和社会决定因素(包括对毒品、反广告、角色建模和获取的态度和信念)的重要性，以及毒品使用的一系列潜在后果(包括身体健康、心理健康、地位获得、角色表现以及药物滥用和依赖)。调查人员将继续为其他人为广泛的研究目的广泛使用MTF数据提供便利。这项研究的测量范围非常广泛，涵盖(A)大量合法和非法药物的开始、使用和停止；(B)对这些药物的态度和信念，以及对这些药物的感知、同伴规范和榜样群体中的规范；(C)其他行为和个人特征(犯罪、学业表现、计划、抱负等)；以及(D)关键社会环境(家庭、工作、学校)和社会角色地位、经历和转变(婚姻、怀孕、为人父母、离婚)的方面。研究结果将继续对理解和预防从青春期到中年的药物使用和滥用具有重大意义。

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): This application seeks a five-year continuation of the Monitoring the Future (MTF) study, an ongoing epidemiological and etiological research and reporting project begun in 1975. In addition to being a basic research study, MTF has become the nation's most reliable source of information on trends in drug use among American adolescents, college students, and young adults. Nationally representative sample surveys will be conducted annually of 8th-, loth-, and i2th-grade students (about 16,000 in 140 schools per year per grade). A separate application seeks continuation of the mail follow-ups of high school graduates at modal ages 19-30,35,40, 45, and 50. The study's cohort-sequential longitudinal design permits the measurement and differentiation of three types of change-age (developmental), period (historical), and cohort. Each type has different classes of determinants, and all three types have been shown by this study to have occurred for most drugs. Factors that may explain historical trends and cohort differences will be monitored. MTF has the further objectives of documenting the natural history of drug use and related attitudes through middle adulthood, and determining the individual and contextual characteristics and social role transitions that contribute to change and stability in drug use and related attitudes. Many of these goals can be pursued using the existing cohort-sequential data; but the findings will be extended to new years, cohorts, and ages with the new data to be collected under this application and the separate follow-up application. The study will examine the importance of many other hypothesized psychological, behavioral, and social determinants of drug use (including attitudes and beliefs about drugs, counter-advertising, role-modeling, and access), as well as a range of potential consequences of drug use (including physical health, psychological well-being, status attainment, role performance, and drug abuse and dependence). The investigators will continue to facilitate the extensive use of MTF data by others for a wide range of research purposes. The study's very broad measurement covers (a) initiation, use, and cessation for a great many licit and illicit drugs; (b) attitudes and beliefs about these drugs, as well as perceived availability, peer norms, and norms among role model groups; (c) other behaviors and individual characteristics (delinquency, school performance, plans, aspirations, etc.); and (d) aspects of key social environments (home, work, school) and social role statuses, experiences, and transitions (marriage, pregnancy, parenthood, divorce). Study results will continue to have major implications for understanding and preventing drug use and abuse from adolescence through middle adulthood.