Are social networking sites turning teens into substance abusers?
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(CBS) Is social networking turning America's youth into substance abusers?
Teens who use Facebook and other social networking sites on a daily basis are three times as likely to drink alcohol, twice as likely to use marijuana, and five times more likely to smoke tobacco than teens who don't frequent the sites.
"The findings in this year's survey should strike Facebook fear into the hearts of parents of young children and drive home the need for parents to give their children the will and skill to keep their heads above the water of the corrupting cultural currents their children must navigate," study author Joseph A. Califano, Jr., founder and chairman of Columbia University's National Center on Addiction and Substance abuse, said in a written statement.
Seventy percent of teens spend time on these sites every day, according to the survey. That's 17 million 12- to 17- year-olds.
According to Califano, looking at pictures of teens getting drunk, using drugs, and passing out contributes to this risky behavior. Compared to teens who never saw these images on social networking sites, picture viewers where three times more likely to drink alcohol, four times more likely to smoke pot, and three to four times more able to obtain marijuana and illegal prescription drugs.
"Continuing to provide the electronic vehicle for transmitting such images constitutes electronic child abuse," according to Califano.
The study also looked at how television contributes to teen's risky habits.
Not surprisingly, watching Snooki and the gang get sauced week-after-week may be affecting teen viewers. The survey found one-third watch shows like "Jersey Shore," "Teen Mom," and teen dramas like "Gossip Girl." Compared to teens that don't watch this suggestive programming, these 12- to 17-year-olds are almost twice as likely to drink and use marijuana.
"They see these images and there are no moral or educational statements accompanying them, so teens may be left with the impression that this is what the real world is about and that everybody is doing it, so it is OK," Dr. Andres Huberman, medical director at North Shore Long Island Jewish Hospitals' project outreach in West Hempstead, N.Y., told WebMD.
Should parents curb their kids social networking use? If the survey results are any indication, they haven't been. Nearly 90 percent of parents surveyed as part of the study said they didn't think social networking sites would make their kids more likely to drink or do drugs.
Califano told WebMD, "It is a phenomenal assault on public health that we subject teens to pictures of drugs, alcohol, or teens being drunk or passed out on the Internet, in films, and on TV shows that are suggestive and glorify drinking and drugging."
Do you agree?
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This study is done every year and reports a number of statistically signifigant correlations: parents access to tobacco and drugs, the amount done at the schools, the amount of time they watch television shows like skins and jersey shore,
.... none of those relationships are considered causal.
Most of the stories being written on this study are emphasizing the link to social networking sites because it was new and its an angle that sells: parents will blame anything for this behavior.
One of the really big effects seen in the study was from so called "dirty" schools where drug use was much higher than other schools.
When a student goes to one of these schools all their text messages, social networking messages, and photos are going to reflect the more extreme sub culture present there.
I think its very important for parents not to have a knee jerk reaction and think that by eliminating facebook they are going to prevent their kids from haivng sex and doing drugs.
If you will remember back to the 90's, there was a story that broke in Rockdale Georgia -
"The Lost Children of Rockdale County" ( http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/georgia/etc/script.html )
So clearly social networking is not the cause but rather a symptom of unhealthy sub cultures evolving at specific high schools.
"Despite assurances of confidentiality, some
teenage respondents will be reluctant to admit
inappropriate or illegal activities to someone
unknown to them over the telephone or the
Internet. * Therefore, this survey--like any
telephone or Internet-based survey conducted in
the home and asking respondents to self-report
proscribed behaviors--may under-report the
extent of the use of illegal drugs, the
consumption of tobacco products and alcohol by
teenagers, and other negative behaviors, and
may over-report positive behaviors. The
parental permission requirement also may
contribute to under-reporting of proscribed
behaviors.
"
Would it stand to reason that somebody who is afraid of posting pictures
of themselves online might also be wary of sharing information about
their social activities with a random stranger on the phone?
2nd Yesterday my sister posted on Facebook that she was at the ID college campus that she goes to (she is an 40+ year old going to school) and there are Marketing Materials for Sterling Savings with ads for Budweiser on them. Please remember many college students are under the age of 21, is this appropriate?
There are many things we have to teach our children and it is OUR RESPONSIBITY to teach the about drugs and Alcohol. But for some reason we are always having to talk over advertisments, TV shows, Movies and now Social Networks. WE can not wrap a cocoon around our children so it is so important as parents that we keep track of what they do, who they hang with and what going on with them. Maybe if Hollywood and some Corporations cared more about the information they are putting out there we wouldn't have to worry so much about them but as long as they continue to put out this stuff we have to be diligent with our children!
We are no longer living in a era that keeps adult situations away from our children and I say THAT IS JUST SO SAD!!
According to this same organization forty-nine percent (3.8 million) of full time college students binge drink and/or abuse prescription and illegal drugs. College causes drug use. Who'd have thought it?
Basically, anything a teenager actually LIKES to do causes drug use according to these guys.
This article hits the nail on the head then conveniently shifts these social issues onto the shoulders of electronic media. The children who are lacking parental supervision on the computer would of course be the same children lacking the "will and skill" in other areas of social behavior.