DANGEROUS MISPERCEPTIONS

If more young people realized that many of their peers aren't drinking or
taking drugs, fewer would feel compelled to experiment.

"Students very often over-perceive alcohol and drug abuse among peers,"
says Pamela Negro, director of Rowan University's Center for Addiction
Studies. "Social norms [an alcohol and drug prevention approach used by
professionals] is about correcting those misperceptions so that young
people make wiser choices."

Negro will join other educators and law enforcement officials for a daylong
conference on substance abuse prevention Friday at Waterloo Village in
Stanhope.

The "Party Drugs - Perception vs. Reality" conference will include
discussions on social norms programs, ecstasy and other illicit drugs, and
alcohol. The talks will be led by a health educator, DEA agent, and several
drug prevention specialists, including Negro.

"It's really about learning to ask young people to look at the reality of
drug use among their peers," Negro says. "It's about helping them focus not
on the one or two people at a party who are drunk or high and acting
stupid, but on the majority who are non-drinkers or moderate drinkers."

Negro says several studies show that many college students, particularly
freshmen, believe their peers drink more than they do, which makes them
drink even more. But if they know what their peers actually consume,
they'll follow that social norm and drink, say, three or four beers in an
evening rather than 10.

"If we really ask them to look at the reality, rather than their own
perceptions, we could effectively reduce the amount of heavy drinking and
drug use that goes on," she says.

Negro says the social norms' approach works best when it's promoted in ways
that praise the achievements of young people and offers them drug-free
social alternatives, such as comedy night at a coffeehouse.

"It's sounds very simple, but we place a lot of positive posters around
campus mentioning how many students are not using," she says. "It's
important to take this kind of approach because we know lecturing and scare
tactics don't work."

The $10 workshop includes lunch. It is open to the public and offers
professional educators four hours of continuing education credits. The
conference is being sponsored by the Community Health Trust of Saint
Clare's Hospital in Dover, the Verizon Foundation, and Morris County
Prevention Is Key.