Methodological Developments in the Prevention of Adolescent Drug Use

描述(申请人提供)：青少年药物使用问题在健康、教育和社会后果方面都是研究人员、政策制定者和公众非常关注的问题。因为大多数关于物质使用及其相关性的数据都是在自然环境中收集的，所以关于物质使用和滥用的因果路径的结论受到了限制。这笔赠款的培训部分的目标是加强。促进青少年吸毒发展和预防知识的统计技术方面的技能，以及青少年吸毒问题的知识库，重点是族裔和性别差异。该研究方案的目标是应用当代和新的方法，提高对青春期药物使用的规范发展轨迹以及这些轨迹在一系列性别和族裔群体中的因果机制的理解。这项研究的第一个总体目标是确定预测和发展规范青少年药物使用的一般模型和亚人群特定模型，使用创新的轨迹和混合建模方法来分析NIDA资助的全国父母和青年调查数据。鉴于这一大型数据集中不同种族和性别群体的规范轨迹，我们将确定已建立的青少年药物使用预测因素的种族和性别特异性。第二个总体目标是使用NIMH资助的快速通道项目的数据，检验干预对高危青少年使用青少年物质的中介因果效应的假设，该项目是一个旨在减少青少年行为问题的长期干预计划和现场实验。我们将首先测试第一个总体目标的结果的可重复性，然后使用培训计划中开发的技术-评估潜在的因果路径和将快速通道干预与青少年药物使用变化联系起来的中介关系。NSPY和Fast Track数据集代表着在实验和非实验环境中研究物质使用发展的独特机会。我们将使用统计建模方面的最新和新进展，其中将培训PI，以促进我们对种族、性别和其他结构在药物使用预防中的复杂作用的理解。

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): The problem of substance use among adolescents is of great concern to researchers, policy makers, and the public in terms of health, education, and social consequences. Because most data regarding substance use and its correlates have been collected in natural settings, conclusions about the causal pathways to substance use and abuse have been constrained. The goal of the training portion of this grant is to enhance. both the Pi's skills in the statistical techniques for furthering knowledge of the development and prevention of youth drug use and the Pi's knowledge base in issues relating to youth substance use with a focus on ethnic and gender differences. The goal of the research program is to apply contemporary and new methods to improve understanding about the normative developmental trajectories of substance use during adolescence and the causal mechanisms in those trajectories across a range of gender and ethnic groups. The first general aim of the research is to identify general and subpopulation-specific models of the prediction and development of normative adolescent substance use, using innovative trajectory and mixture modeling methods to analyze data from the NIDA-funded National Survey of Parents and Youth-. Given the normative trajectories in this large dataset for different ethnic and gender groups, we will then identify the ethnic- and gender-specificity of established predictors of adolescent substance use. The second general aim is to test hypotheses of mediated causal effects of an intervention on adolescent substance use in high-risk youth, using data from the NIMH-funded Fast Track project, a long-term intervention program and field experiment intended to reduce youth conduct problems. We will first test the replicability of the findings from the first general aim, then - using techniques developed in the training program - evaluate potential causal pathways and mediating relations linking the Fast Track intervention to changes in adolescent substance use. The NSPY and Fast Track datasets represent unique opportunities to study the development of substance use in both experimental and non-experimental contexts. We will use recent and novel advances in statistical modeling, in which the PI will be trained, to advance our understanding of the complex role of ethnicity, gender, and other constructs in substance use prevention.