Since 1992, marijuana use among 8th graders has tripled, among 10th graders it has nearly doubled, and its use among high school seniors has increased by 50 percent. The use of other illicit drugs is also heavily on the rise. Yet, there exists very little research and literature on the etiology and prevention of drug abuse among those most at risk--disadvantaged, inner-city, minority youth. The Etiology and Prevention of Drug Abuse Among Minority Youth is an important first step in remedying this gap in the literature and for getting at the heart of the psychosocial factors that promote and sustain drug use among minority youth.

The book’s chapters evolved from a program of research funded by the National Institute on Drug Abuse and Cornell University Medical College’s Institute for Prevention Research concerning drug abuse prevention with multi-ethnic youth. So that you might learn effective strategies for intervening with at-risk adolescents and teenagers, The Etiology and Prevention of Drug Abuse Among Minority Youth discusses:

• correlates and predictors of alcohol and drug use
• community-based skills interventions
• how youths offset feelings of distress or self-derogation by bonding with deviant peers
• the advantages of community-oriented outreach programs
• the role of cultural factors as they shape vulnerability to adolescent alcohol and drug use
• the role of ethnic identity as a moderator of psychosocial risk for alcohol and marijuana use
• the needs of youth at high risk for future use
• preventing gateway drug use
• drug use among youth living in homeless shelters
• the conditions of public housing and how they affect the etiology of drug abuse
  
  An essential tool for policymakers, social workers, clinicians, researchers, psychiatrists, and other professionals in chemical dependency and narcotics rehabilitation, The Etiology and Prevention of Drug Abuse Among Minority Youth provides you with vital insight on the causes of drug use among minority adolescents, the strengths and limitations of different intervention approaches, and incentive to find appropriate ways for working with at-risk, minority teenagers.