CONTINUITY AND DISCONTINUITY IN ILLICIT DRUG-USE - PATTERNS AND ANTECEDENTS

Drug research has tended to focus on initiation and progressions of us e. In this article we employ event history analysis to test a social l earning model to identify factors associated with both the onset and d iscontinuity of drug use. Eight waves of the National Youth Survey (NY S), a panel study of a national probability sample of youth in the Uni ted States, provide fourteen years (1976-1989) of drug use information for 1,172 respondents aged eleven through thirty. Results include the following. once initiation has occurred, drug use is maintained for a n extended timer demographic characteristics have very little effect o n either initiation or desistance of drug use; variables representing social learning theory are more important in accounting for initiation than discontinuity of drug user and life events such as marriage and becoming a parent increase the odds of discontinuing drug use.