ABSTRACT
A recent survey on drug abuse among schoolchildren documented that the current use (within the past 30 days) of cigarettes and marijuana increased significantly among eighth graders (Monitoring the Future Survey, 1996). 1 Between 1995 to 1996, the use of cigarettes increased from 19.1 percent to 21 percent; marijuana use increased from 9.1 percent to 11.3 percent; the percentage who reported having been “drunk” in the past month increased from 8.3 percent to 9.6 percent Another national survey (National Household Survey on Drug Abuse, 1996) found that, during the same time period, more teenagers in the twelve- to seventeen-year-old age group tried heroin for the first time; that children’s perception of cocaine as risky was down; and that the use of hallucinogens continued an upward trend. Although the rate of use for all illicit drugs in the twelve to 78seventeen age group declined from 10.9 percent in 1995 to 9 percent in 1996, this survey reported that in 1996, 4.1 million smoked cigarettes in this age group, and there were about nine million current alcohol drinkers under age twenty-one. Youths age twelve to seventeen who currently smoked cigarettes were about nine times as likely to use illicit drugs and sixteen times as likely to drink heavily as non-smoking youths. In another survey, America’s children and their parents identified drugs as the biggest problem they face (National Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse, 1996).
