Personal, Home, and School Factors Related to Eleventh Graders' Drug Attitudes

Abstract

Forty-seven thousand 11th grade students were tested in 1974 as part of a statewide educational quality assessment procedure in Pennsylvania. Two drug attitude items were selected for analysis from the assessment scales. Abusive and abstinent attitude groups were formed from a random sample of students (n = 3,568), and compared across 24 other assessment variables related to demographic, personal, home, and school characteristics. Significant differences were found between the two groups for 20 of the variables. The findings support earlier research relating psychosocial constructs to substance-abuse attitudes and use-patterns, and can be interpreted as supportive of comprehensive preventive education strategies.