PSYCHOSOCIAL CORRELATES OF SUBSTANCE USE - COMPARING HIGH-SCHOOL-STUDENTS WITH INCARCERATED OFFENDERS IN HONG-KONG

Drug use prevalence data were obtained from 969 adolescents, high scho ol students and imprisoned offenders who reported use of cough medicin e, organic solvents, cannabis, heroin, tranquilizers, and narcotics ov er the past six months. Incarcerated youths, in particular girls, had higher prevalence rates than students. Drug use frequencies were assoc iated with psychosocial variables such as disinhibition, peer drug use , susceptibility to peer pressure, attitudes, encouragement by peers, and perceived availability of drugs. The psychosocial process of the i nitiation and maintenance of substance use was specified as a path mod el that considered 1) personality and social environment as distal pre cursors and 2) a drug-use predisposition and perceived availability as proximal precursors of three kinds of outcome variables: drug use, th e intention to try illicit drugs if they were legal, and adverse outco mes of drug use. It was found that the same structural equation model fit the data of both samples of offenders and students, however, with very different weights assigned to the paths.