Donald B. Stone

Home Alone: Is it a Risk Factor for Middle School Youth and Drug Use?

This study examined the relationship between middle school/junior high student latchkey status and early experimentation and use of alcohol, tobacco, and other drugs. Students were queried about the frequency (number of times per week) and quantity (number of hours per day) of unsupervised after school days in an average week. Questions were also asked regarding their experiences with “gateway” drugs, inhalants, and steroids. Chi square analysis was used to test the strength of association. The results of this study indicated that latchkey youth (LKY) who were home alone two or more days per week were four times more likely to have gotten drunk in the past month than those youth who had parental supervision five or more times a week. Also, significant differences were observed for LKY with respect to cigarette smoking, inhalants, and marijuana use. Other findings and demographic variables were discussed as they pertain to LKY as well as suggested strategies for healthy self-care alternatives.

Psychological Status of Student Drug Users

The purpose of this study was to determine how a childs self-concept influences their drug attitudes and behaviors. In addition to identifying specific drug practices, students responded to four subscales of the California Test of Personality. “Anti-Social Tendencies” and “Family Relations” correlated significantly and negatively with the use of almost all substances and positively with drug attitude. “Feeling of Belongong” was related negatively to the use of the more dangerous drugs.

Profile of an Effective Hospice Team Member

This study was designed to determine the competencies that hospice practitioners and experts in the field would agree upon as necessary attributes to being an effective hospice team member. The Delphi method was employed to solicit the desired competencies. Subsequently, after further data analysis, the final version of the questionnaire was reduced to twenty-nine items. The results indicated strong positive agreement between the rankings of the practitioners, emotional and interpersonal characteristics needed by hospice personnel to effectively function with the dying and their families in a hospital environment.

Antismoking education study at the University of Illinois.

A STUDY conducted in Portland, Oreg., in 1958 by Horn and co-workers (I) served as a stimulus for a series of studies on the smoking behavior of youth. This research frequently involved an analysis of smoker and nonsmoker characteristics in addition to studying the effects of various types of antismoking messages presented by mass media. While this information may be useful for developing public health measures, the educator generally is more concerned with research on the teaching-learning process in the classroom environment. If health education in schools is to aid young people in resisting the pressures to smoke cigarettes, then such factors as the teachers influence, teaching methods, curriculum materials, peer group, and parental influence need more intensive study. Before initiating such research, however, the study team at the University of Illinois agreed

A Prospective Study of Trends in Youth Smoking

To assess smoking trends of junior and senior high school youth, a prospective study was conducted over a two year period. A total of 10,565 subjects comprised the study population. The resultant data were analyzed by smoking behavior classification, grade level, and sex. Comparisons of smoking rates by matched and unmatched samples were also included. The findings supported the contention that behavioral patterns with respect to smoking and nonsmoking behavior are well established by the junior high school years. The authors maintain that from an educational point of view, smoking education programs must begin before the junior high school years. Educators need to recognize the characteristics of the target population to maximize the effect and efficiency of their educational programs.

Cigarette Smoking Attitudes of Lower Socioeconomic Sixth Grade Students.

Little research has been done assessing the cigarette smoking attitudes of lower socioeconomic students. In addition, there is a lack of information with respect to assessing the impact of health education programs on lower socioeconomic groups. The study was conducted in three lower socioeconomic elementary schools in a midwestern and eastern metropolitan area. All students involved in the study completed the attitude inventory. Both a pre-posttest design, and a Solomon Three Group Design were used to assess the cigarette smoking attitudes of lower socioeconomic sixth grade students after exposure to a special health program. The findings revealed that students exposed to the special health program developed more positive attitudes toward not smoking than students receiving their regular health instruction.

Smoking Behavior Change among Junior High School Youth

The authors studied a sample of junior high school students who had made a change of behavior either from smoker to nonsmoker or from nonsmoker to smoker. The purpose of the study was to identify those attitude-belief factors associated with a change in smoking behavior. Results from this study indicate that there are certain attitude and belief characteristics that correlate highly with current smoking behavior status. This study has also shown that the attitude-belief scale employed by the authors was sensitive to change of attitudes and beliefs by reflecting significant changes in total scores obtained by the different smoking behavior groupings.