Drug Addiction Prevention 2: What are the early signs of risk that may predict later drug abuse?

CEBU, Philippines - Some signs of risk that may predict later drug abuse can be seen as early as infancy. Children’s personality traits or temperament can place them at increased risk for later drug abuse. Withdrawn and aggressive boys, for example, often exhibit problem behaviors in interactions with their families, peers, and others they encounter in social settings. If these behaviors continue, they will likely lead to other risks. These risks can include academic failure, early peer rejection, and later affiliation with deviant peers, often the most immediate risk for drug abuse in adolescence. Studies have shown that children with poor academic performance and inappropriate social behavior at ages 7 to 9 are more likely to be involved with substance abuse by age 14 or 15.

In the Family

Children’s earliest interactions occur within the family and can be positive or negative. For this reason, factors that affect early development in the family are probably the most crucial. Children are more likely to experience risk when there is:

• lack of mutual attachment and nurturing by parents or caregivers;

• ineffective parenting;

• a chaotic home environment;

• lack of a significant relationship with a caring adult; and

• a caregiver who abuses substances, suffers from mental illness, or engages in criminal behavior.

These experiences, especially the abuse of drugs and other substances by parents and other caregivers, can impede bonding to the family and threaten feelings of security that children need for healthy development. On the other hand, families can serve a protective function when there is:

• a strong bond between children and their families;

• parental involvement in a child’s life;

• supportive parenting that meets financial, emotional, cognitive, and social needs; and

• clear limits and consistent enforcement of discipline.

Finally, critical or sensitive periods in development may heighten the importance of risk or protective factors. For example, mutual attachment and bonding between parents and children usually occurs in infancy and early childhood. If it fails to occur during those developmental stages, it is unlikely that a strong positive attachment will develop later in the child’s life.

Outside the Family

Other risk factors relate to the quality of children’s relationships in settings outside the family, such as in their schools, with their peers, teachers, and in the community. Difficulties in these settings can be crucial to a child’s emotional, cognitive, and social development. Some of these risk factors are:

• inappropriate classroom behavior, such as aggression and impulsivity;

• academic failure;

• poor social coping skills;

• association with peers with problem behaviors, including drug abuse; and

• misperceptions of the extent and acceptability of drug-abusing behaviors in school, peer, and community environments.

Association with drug-abusing peers is often the most immediate risk for exposing adolescents to drug abuse and delinquent behavior. Research has shown, however, that addressing such behavior in interventions can be challenging. For example, a recent study found that placing high-risk youth in a peer group intervention resulted in negative outcomes. Current research is exploring the role that adults and positive peers can play in helping to avoid such outcomes in future interventions.

Other factors—such as drug availability, drug trafficking patterns, and beliefs that drug abuse is generally tolerated—are also risks that can influence young people to start to abuse drugs.

Family has an important role in providing protection for children when they are involved in activities outside the family. When children are outside the family setting, the most salient protective factors are:

• age-appropriate parental monitoring of social behavior, including establishing curfews, ensuring adult supervision of activities outside the home, knowing the child’s friends, and enforcing household rules;

• success in academics and involvement in extracurricular activities;

• strong bonds with prosocial institutions, such as school and religious institutions; and

• acceptance of conventional norms against drug abuse.

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