MORE TEENS JUST SAY NO

Study: Smoking, Drinking And Drug Use Drop

Smoking, drinking and the use of illegal drugs among teenagers fell
simultaneously this year for the first time, according to an annual survey
conducted for the National Institute on Drug Abuse.

The survey, known as Monitoring the Future, and carried out by the
University of Michigan's Institute for Social Research, also found a drop
in the use of the club drug ``ecstasy'' after several recent years in which
the drug had exploded in popularity among adolescents.

``The fact that there are such broad declines in all forms of substance
abuse is very encouraging,'' said Lloyd Johnston, a University of Michigan
psychologist who led the study.

But the use of heroin, cocaine and crack cocaine, drugs for which there has
been far less of an organized campaign by the government or private groups
to publicize their dangers in the past few years, held about even,
according to the study.

The survey tracks substance abuse among eighth-, 10th- and 12th-graders,
using a randomly selected sample of 44,000 students in 400 schools across
the nation. It has been conducted since 1975. Because of its methodology,
the size of the sampling and the prestige of the institution conducting it,
the survey is considered the most reliable indicator of teenage substance
abuse.

Experts offered varied theories for the declines.

Johnston said the across-the-board drop in smoking, drinking and drug use,
which took place among all three grade levels, suggested that some large
force was at work, perhaps the impact of the Sept. 11 attacks.

``A decline in use already was under way for a number of substances,
including cigarettes, inhalants, LSD and others,'' Johnston said.

``But the downturn in alcohol this year was striking and overall illicit
drug use began to decline for the first time across the board,'' he said.
``So, I think it quite possible that the tragedy of 9/11 had somewhat of a
sobering effect on the country's young people.''

John Walters, director of the White House Office of National Drug Control
Policy, agreed that the events of Sept. 11 played a role in the decrease in
teen smoking, drinking and drug use.

``Before 9/11 the world was a giant shopping mall for young people,''
Walters said. ``Now, they are taking things more seriously and paying
attention to adult warnings about risks.''

But Dr. Glen Hanson, the acting director of the National Institute on Drug
Abuse, said there was no scientific evidence of a Sept. 11 effect. The
survey does not question students about why they do or do not use drugs.

``It has not been studied,'' Hanson said. ``You could make the opposite
case -- that 9/11 made people more anxious and prone to substance abuse.''

Instead, Hanson said he believed the explanation for the overall drop lay
in teenagers' increased perception of the risks involved in smoking,
drinking and drug use with an increase in negative advertising on TV and in
other media, some of it paid for by the settlement of lawsuits with tobacco
companies.

One of the biggest declines occurred in smoking, with the proportion of
teenagers who said that they had never smoked cigarettes falling by four or
five percentage points compared with 2001 in each of the three grades.