One approach to determining the validity of self-reported drug use measures is to examine the extent of logically inconsistent responses over time. Because lifetime use logically should never decline, the rate of subsequent recanting of earlier reported lifetime use provides relevant evidence on validity. In this chapter, recanting rates are examined in nationally representative samples of high school seniors (18-year-olds) surveyed in the Monitoring the Future study as they are followed up on seven occasions through age 32. For the illegal drugs examined (marijuana, cocaine, and lysergic acid diethylamide (LSD)), recanting rates prove to be quite modest, but for the psychotherapeutic drugs, they were more substantial, possibly because of their greater definitional ambiguity. In general, there were no large individual differences in recanting rates as a function of sex, household composition, community size, or education level. Consistent with previous work, minorities (particularly African Americans) had somewhat higher rates of recanting on the illegal drugs. So did respondents in certain occupations, namely, the military and police/firefighting. In general, however, the evidence is quite good for validity of self-reported (by mail) lifetime use of the illegal drugs in young adulthood.

Official records offer a relatively inexpensive, nonintrusive strategy for checking on the accuracy of self-reported drug use. Responses of a small sample (N = 67) of former drug treatment clients interviewed using procedures exactly modeled on the National Household Survey on Drug Abuse were compared to their clinic records. The accuracy of reports compared to clinic records varied by drug, with the percentage of known users reporting their use highest for marijuana, followed by cocaine and hallucinogens, and lowest for heroin. Almost half of this sample of former treatment clients denied ever receiving drug treatment.

for providing the Monitoring the Future data. Finally, we would like to thank Chee-Ruey Hsieh and conference participants for helpful comments on this paper. The views expressed herein are those of the

The purpose of this study is to examine the question of whether alcohol or drug use causes teenagers to engage in violent behaviors as measured by physical fighting, carrying a gun, or carrying other types of weapons. Simple OLS estimation of the effects of drug and alcohol consumption on violence may be biased because of the possibility that both behaviors are determined by unmeasured individual traits. Two-stage least squares estimates are employed to establish causality. This method first predicts consumption using the prices of beer, marijuana and cocaine and then enters predicted consumption in the violence equation. This technique allows the consumption measures to be purged of their correlation with unobserved characteristics. Data come from the National School-Based Youth Risk Behavior Surveys, which are nationally representative samples of high school students. Results indicate that beer and marijuana consumption do cause teens to engage in more physical fights, while cocaine use appears to have no relationship. None of the substances lead to increased probabilities of carrying a gun or other weapon.

The research described in this chapter used psychometric meta-analysis (Hunter and Schmidt 1990b) to examine the validity of integrity tests for predicting drug and alcohol abuse. Integrity tests have previously been found to predict other counterproductive workplace behaviors (e.g.,

This study examines the validity of a norm-reinforcement approach as a complementary model to direct media effects on health behavior change. Focusing on news coverage effects on youth binge drinking between 1978 and 1996, it was hypothesized that the media may have contributed to the reduction in this behavior by increasing perceptions of social disapproval.The predictive power of this approach was then compared with that of other plausible models (namely, a direct effect model and a model proposing media effects that are mediated by policy actions). The findings from two separate tests (a timeseries regression and the ideodynamic method) suggest that although a direct route of media effects on binge-drinking behavior produced evidence of null effects, there was evidence that the impact of news stories on this behavior was mediated by policy actions as well as by changes in the social acceptability of this behavior. Implications of this approach to the study of media effects on health behavior change are discussed. Many contemporary public health problems are a consequence of lifestyle behaviors such as smoking, alcohol abuse, and unprotected sex (McGinnis & Foege, 1993). Health communication campaigns have been the primary vehicle for educating the public about the negative consequences of performing these behaviors (J. Brown & Walsh-Childers, 1994; Lapinski & Witte, 1998; Rice & Atkin, 1989). Through the dissemination of persuasive health information to the public, these campaigns seek to influence behavioral attitudes and beliefs that will encourage individuals to quit unhealthy practices. Overall, however, there is little and inconclusive evidence of association between

In considering the relationship between marijuana use during pregnancy and the impact of such use upon the behavioral outcome of the young children of these pregnancies, the paucity of objective information is striking and, from one point of view, quite surprising. Marijuana is far

the complex processes through which individual characteristics, family processes, and community structures come together to influence risk for substance use and abuse. This chapter considers the fact that individuals and families live in communities that vary greatly in terms of cultural and ethnic heritage, socioeconomic conditions, geographic placement, and population density. The drama of individual lives, including achieve- ments and behavioral dysfunctions, is played out against the backdrop of these important social, economic, and cultural variations. The following discussion indicates how significant distinctions between and within the categories of urban and rural locations play a major role in influencing how the dynamics portrayed in the aforementioned chapter actually occur in daily life. Researchers and policymakers concerned about the problems of substance abuse have turned their attention from a singular focus on

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The purpose of this study was to explore the relationship between student leadership and alcohol use. Previous literature had examined alcohol use of leaders and non-leaders in high-use organizations -- Greeks and athletes. This study extends that literature by focusing on leaders and non-leaders in low-use organizations, and by examining students with multiple leadership roles. The research used existing data from the Core Alcohol and Drug Survey. A random sample of 2,000 respondents was obtained from the Core Institute at Southern Illinois University -- Carbondale. Respondents were leaders and non-leader members of minority and ethnic organizations and religious and interfaith groups. From this total sample, 624 students were active in minority organizations only, 865 were involved in religious groups only, and 511 were active in both. Dependent variables were drawn from four questions on the Core Survey concerning average number of drinks per week, consumption of five or more drinks at one sitting, negative consequences of alcohol use, and alcohol-related beliefs. No statistically significant differences were found in the alcohol use of leader and nonleaders who were active only in minority groups. Significant differences were found however, between leaders and non-leaders who were active only in religious groups. For these groups, leaders consumed alcohol, engaged in high-risk drinking, experienced negative consequences, and ascribed to alcohol-related myths at a lower rate than those not in leadership positions. Student in dual leadership positions across the whole sample reported significantly higher alcohol use than student involved in one leadership position. Students with leadership roles in iii both minority and religious organizations drank approximately thre...