National survey results on drug use, 1975-2004. Volume I: Secondary school students

In 2004 the Monitoring the Future study marked its 30th year of conducting national surveys of substance use among American young people. Beginning with the first survey of high school seniors in 1975, the study has provided the nation with a window through which to view the important, but largely hidden, problem behaviors of illicit drug use, alcohol use, and cigarette smoking. It has thus enabled the nation to gain a better understanding of the changing nature of these problems, as well as some of their causes and consequences. An epidemic of illicit drug use emerged in the 1960s among American youth, and since then dramatic changes have occurred in the use of nearly all the specific drugs that have been part of the epidemic. Alcohol and cigarettes also have shown some very important changes in use in the intervening decades. Many new drugs have emerged to become part of an illicit drug smorgasbord available to American young people, and even some new forms of cigarettes and alcoholic beverages have emerged. Unfortunately, very few have been taken off the table. This annual monograph series has been the primary vehicle for disseminating the epidemiological findings from the study. It has grown substantially over the years in both coverage and size, in part because of the proliferation of substances being used. This latest two-volume monograph presents the results of the 30th (2004) national survey of drug use and related attitudes and beliefs among American high school seniors, the 25th such survey of American college students, and the 14th such survey of 8th- and 10th-grade students. Results have also been reported for varying intervals on young adult high school graduates, as well as adult high school graduates into middle age (currently through age 45), who have been followed from high school graduation through a series of panel studies. Results from the secondary school samples of 8th, 10th, and 12th graders are contained in this Volume I. (Extract of the publication)