Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Neuroscience, University of Chicago, CNPRU, Chicago, Illinois 60637, USA.
J Adolesc Health. 2012 Feb;50(2):154-63. doi: 10.1016/j.jadohealth.2011.05.013. Epub 2011 Jul 13.
The current study examined gender and racial/ethnic (Hispanics, non-Hispanic Caucasians, non-Hispanic African Americans, and non-Hispanic Asians) differences in developmental trajectories of alcohol use, heavy drinking, smoking, and marijuana use from early adolescence to young adulthood using a nationally representative sample.
Participants from the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health (N = 20,160) reported rates of alcohol use, heavy drinking, smoking, and marijuana use between the ages of 12 and 34 years. Data analyses were completed using longitudinal multilevel modeling analyses.
Levels of substance use increased from early adolescence to mid-20s, and then declined thereafter. Females showed higher levels of substance use in early adolescence, although males exhibited greater changes overtime and higher levels of use in mid-adolescence and early adulthood. Overall, Hispanic youth had higher initial rates of substance use, whereas Caucasian adolescents showed higher rates of change and had the highest levels of substance use from mid-adolescence through the early 30s. Racial/ethnic differences largely disappeared after age 30, except that African Americans showed higher final levels of smoking and marijuana use than the other racial/ethnic groups. Results provide evidence for both similarities and differences in general patterns of development and in gender and racial/ethnic differences across different forms of substance use.
Findings from the current study suggest that the critical periods for intervention and prevention of substance use may differ across gender and race/ethnicity, and that future research needs to identify common and unique mechanisms underlying developmental patterns of different forms of substance use.
本研究使用全国代表性样本，考察了性别和种族/族裔（西班牙裔、非西班牙裔白种人、非西班牙裔非裔美国人和非西班牙裔亚裔）在青少年早期到成年早期的酒精使用、重度饮酒、吸烟和大麻使用发展轨迹上的差异。
来自青少年健康纵向研究（N = 20,160）的参与者报告了他们在 12 至 34 岁之间的酒精使用、重度饮酒、吸烟和大麻使用的频率。数据分析使用纵向多层建模分析完成。
物质使用水平从青少年早期到 20 多岁逐渐升高，然后在此后下降。女性在青少年早期表现出更高的物质使用水平，尽管男性表现出更大的变化，并且在青少年中期和成年早期表现出更高的物质使用水平。总体而言，西班牙裔青少年初始物质使用率较高，而白种人青少年表现出更高的变化率，并且从青少年中期到 30 岁出头，他们的物质使用水平最高。种族/族裔差异在 30 岁以后基本消失，除了非裔美国人的吸烟和大麻使用的最终水平高于其他种族/族裔群体。研究结果表明，在不同形式的物质使用的发展模式以及性别和种族/族裔差异方面，干预和预防物质使用的关键时期可能不同，未来的研究需要确定不同形式的物质使用的发展模式背后的共同和独特机制。
