Examines patterns of drug use and other delinquent behaviors among students and school dropouts in six inner-city neighborhoods. Finds no correlation between substance use, delinquency, and dropping out, but does find that all dropouts were characterized by weak family support systems and social isolation. (FMW)

Examines the effects of variables associated with the onset of a depressive episode on a group of 942 psychoactive drug-using young adults. Finds that controls were free of depressive symptoms but that methaqualone users were more prone to a depressed mood, lower self-esteem, and negative life events than nonusers. (FMW)

Data focused on illegal alcohol and marijuana use were collected in 1981 from 4,859 high school students living in two rural counties in southern Georgia. The sample consisted of over 85% of all students in grades 8 through 12 within the two counties. The data were used to test a facilitative-constraint model developed from selected components of…

Recent national surveys have found marked increases in the use of illicit drugs and alcohol among adolescents. To investigate differential prediction of alcohol versus hard drug use amoung youths, 6% of the youths, aged 10-19, from a Pennsylvania county school system (N=1,689) were assessed on the HEW Community Youth Program Impact Scales. The 12…

This paper examines the conceptual and empirical relationships differentially associated with antisocial behavior and undercontrol, two concepts that frequently are confused. The personality characteristics conceptually associated with antisocial behavior were specified by seven psychologists using the California Child Q-sort (CCQ) to describe…

This paper explores various procedures of panel data in the estimation of causal models. The reported analyses are from the Monitoring the Future study, a nationwide questionnaire survey of 16,000 to 17,000 high school seniors conducted annually since 1975. First, the parameters of causal models are estimated in which the dependent variables are…