Gender-Specific Effects of Social Influences and Competence on Lifetime Poly-Drug Use Among Inner-City Adolescents

Abstract

This study examined the relationship of social influences to use drugs and competence variables with lifetime poly-drug use for adolescents residing in inner-city regions. The same model was tested separately for boys and girls. Sixth- and seventh-graders (N = 2400) in inner-city schools self-reported substance use, social influences to use drugs (e.g., friends' substance use), and competence skills (i.e., refusal assertiveness, decision-making). Logistic regressions indicated that friends' smoking and drinking habits, and permissive/ambivalent parental attitudes toward respondents' drinking, were associated with poly-drug use. High self-efficacy and more frequent refusal assertiveness were related to less poly-drug use for the overall sample. Ambivalent/permissive attitudes of friends toward the respondents' smoking were related to greater poly-drug use for girls, but not boys. Perceptions of higher prevalence norms for peer smoking and less frequent refusal assertiveness each were associated with more poly-drug use for boys, but not girls.

KEYWORDS:

• adolescents
• competence skills
• poly-drug use
• social influences

This study was supported by Grant 1 R03 DA 12432 from the National Institute on Drug Abuse to Dr. Epstein. The smoking prevention trial research from which the data for this study was collected was supported by Grant 1 R18 CA 39280 from the National Cancer Institute to Dr. Botvin.