A Survey of Students' Awareness of and Attitudes toward Drug Abuse Prevention Programs in New York State, Winter 1974/75

Abstract

The present paper reports some results from a winter 1974-1975, New York State survey of junior and senior public high school youths' awareness of and attitudes toward the drug prevention efforts their schools had undertaken. The findings indicate that most youths are not aware of community resources available for assistance with a drug problem. Substantial discrepancies were found between student ratings of the effectiveness of prevention programs and the programs to which they were most frequently exposed. Finally, the data highlight the peer context and drug culture aspect of the youths' substance taking, emphasizing that the sociocultural backgrounds of students need to be taken into account in prevention program development.