Human Services News

From EurekAlert! - Breaking News:

New research results from the University at Buffalo's Research Institute on Addictions (RIA) suggest that most parents are aware of and accurately evaluate the extent of their teenager's cigarette smoking, marijuana use, drinking and overall substance use.

Researchers also found that in cases where parents provided lower estimates of substance use, parents were nearly twice as likely to underestimate frequency of marijuana use and quantity of alcohol use.

Parents also were less likely to be aware of extent of use by younger teens and of their children's use if they themselves had personal problems or were using alcohol more frequently.

What is novel about these findings is that for the first time, detailed statistics are available about parental knowledge of teen substance use for families in which the teen's substance use is causing the parent stress, but the teen is not necessarily in treatment.

For a six-month reporting period, 82 percent of parents accurately evaluated the presence of teen cigarette smoking; the parents' reports corresponded with the teens' reports of their own smoking.

McGillicuddy is a research scientist at RIA with extensive background in treatment interventions for parents of substance-abusing adolescents, interventions for partners of addicted persons and treatment for alcohol and drug-abusing adolescents.

This research was funded by the National Institute on Drug Abuse and published in the most recent issue of the Journal of Child and Adolescent Substance Abuse.

For this study, 75 parents and their teenagers were interviewed separately about the teens' recent use of cigarettes, alcohol, marijuana and other illicit drugs.

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