NCJ Number
166188
Date Published
1996
Length
80 pages
Annotation
The Partnership Attitude Tracking Study interviewed 1,061 parents in 1993, 822 in 1995, and 799 in 1996 to investigate drug use by parents of children under 19 years of age and parent perceptions of drug use by their children.
Abstract
Results of interviews using self-administered questionnaires showed many parents had experimented with marijuana but were not current users. Parents opposed drug use and their negative attitudes remained stable between 1993 and 1996. Parents were less tolerant of marijuana use in 1996 than they were in 1993. Even though nearly 60 percent of parents had tried marijuana at least once in their lives, most said they would not feel like a hypocrite in telling their children not to use marijuana. Although parents believed marijuana experimentation was likely to occur and believed risks were associated with its use, they continued to perceive marijuana was used by people other than their own children. While 97 percent of parents said they had talked to their children about drugs, only 77 percent of teenagers said their parents had talked to them. Levels of parent use of cocaine, crack, LSD, and heroin were low and did not change significantly over the 1993-1996 period. Parents believed their children understood the risks associated with drug use but overestimated teenage awareness of such risks. Parents of both young children and teenagers underestimated the likelihood that their children had been offered drugs and expressed a great deal of interest in obtaining more information on drugs. 63 tables