Summary
Teen drug, alcohol, and tobacco use in the U.S. continues to decline, with record-low usage levels reported in 2023, according to the University of Michigan’s Monitoring the Future survey.
Among 12th graders, 66% reported no recent use of alcohol, marijuana, cigarettes, or e-cigarettes, while 80% of 10th graders and 90% of 8th graders avoided these substances entirely.
Experts attribute the decline partly to reduced peer pressure during the pandemic.
However, nicotine pouch use has doubled among 12th graders, raising concerns.
Despite pop culture’s glamorization of smoking, teen cigarette use remains low.
Pop culture’s glamorization of smoking? What year is it, 1990?
Nah they just broke. The system is not better it’s worse.
Nah, here’s the real reason. When I was the nightclubbing age, you could get a bottle of booze, 6 cans of coke and mineral water for like $50. Last time I went to a club, I paid $120 for the same thing. People in the 18-25 age range don’t have $120 to drop every Friday.
You also have to give credit to youngins these days that they are smart enough to spend money by going to gym and choosing to live a healthier lifestyle instead. This is according to many news report.
And also, I think the rise of social media is to be credited as well because instead of going out to socialise, the younger generation are socialising digitally. Of course social media has its drawbacks, which is getting highlighted more in recent years for understandable reasons, but it also has an upside and really it offers many alternatives that traditions couldn’t. I know us older folks begrudge social media, but hey, it’s here to stay. For better or worse.
It’s probably my choice of gym but I see almost no young people in it. It’s mostly 30-somethings that figured out that eating garbage all the time and staying thin stops at 30. Yes, that includes me.
Worth noting that school age kids have a vastly different free times than most of us. I often see the same group you’re talking about at the gym, but if I show up right after 5 I see a bunch of high schoolers. They must like to go just after school.
That makes a lot sense and I didn’t even thought of that.
I quit smoking a long time ago after many attempts. The key was to simply get poor enough that I simply couldn’t afford it. Perhaps that’s what we’re seeing here.
I don’t have any friend to get high with :((
Whenever I see one of these polls being published I imagine how I would have answered them when I was that age, and I would have lied about every negative seeming question.
What if the poll wasn’t really anonymous and this data was going to be passed on to future employers or schools?
Interesting idea but they are comparing different year surveys with the same age children.
Do you think that kids are more prone to lying now, than earlier years?
I’d wager that teenagers these day are much more aware of data collection and more protective of personal information then they were 10-20 years ago. I could be giving them too much credit, though.
Possibly? Could correspond with increased digital surveillance. Most people understand that nothing is private anymore.
Not only that but back then you didn’t have to worry about it with a simple rule:
They ask you a question, do they know your name or who you are? No? It’s anonymous.
Now you don’t have that anymore. Anything can be linked backed to you cause there is always a digital finger print.
Even if you ask random people on the street, there is facial recognition and cameras everywhere.
I’ll offer this as a possible reason: Kids don’t solo travel like they used to. Kids not wanting driver’s licenses as much is a thing.
I think I can speak for older generations a little - we couldn’t wait to get enough independence to have a bike or driver’s license to get out of the house. There was only the telephone to talk to people - as in no internet, no social media, not everyone had computer games or consoles. Eventually you had messaging services like AIM or IRC, but you didn’t really meet up with friends on them because not everyone had PCs, or cared to learn how to use one. There was cable TV if you were lucky, but you didn’t watch that all day. We went from one friend’s house to another, or friends of friend’s homes. You got exposed to a lot more living conditions, often while completely unsupervised. Bored kids or kids with home problems didn’t mind pilfering the alcohol from the parents, or got whatever drug they could. Usually pot. Nothing else to do. Plus some peer pressure.
Now? Kids text. They meet up online on discord or whatever VoIP or messaging service is cool right now. Group chats. Play online games. They don’t need to leave the house to hang out, and in-person hangouts seem way less important to my kids than it ever was to me when I was younger. That’s a lot less opportunity to be introduced to alcohol or other drugs and have the access to them.
So maybe less peer pressure isn’t necessarily a Covid result, it’s the result of social interaction moving to online spaces and not physical spaces where access to alcohol or other drugs are present.
This is a big part of it for sure. I have a 21 year old nephew who refuses to get his license. He just says yeah I’ve got lots of friends that drive me where I need to go. It’s not always going to be like that, kid.
I got my learner’s permit the day I turned 15 and my license the day I turned 16. Couldn’t wait to get away from my family.
People are also more poor in general.
Wages have been stagnating for over 50 years.
Independence requires financial independence.
It’s not possible to meaningfully participate in society without disposable income.
This leads to the avg person having less power and influence than almost any of their ancestors.
Unfortunately nothing will meaningfully improve until the rich fear for their lives
I mean if you didn’t had disposable income, drugs were the last of your worries in that scenario
you’d wish, but the thing with drugs is “you” (the drugs in you) wanna continue even in poverty and homelessness
They’re vaping plenty
But what if our teenagers all grow up to be lame?
The coolness gap is real.
Seriously, my teenage niece is a complete square, but still looks up to me as her cool uncle, so I encourage her straight laced nerdiness.
Hopefully she doesn’t burn out in her 20s and make a series of painful but cool mistakes like I did.
This is why it’s important for teenagers to make their coolest mistakes early on in life while there are fewer consequences.
This is why I’m so annoyed at college “police services” and serious crackdowns on protests. WTF, college, this is not what I pay you for. I pay you to be a sandbox where little Johnny can grow and develop and find his voice. Yes, also suffer consequences for his mistakes, but non-serious consequences. Your job is to better prepare him for life, not ruin his life.
My own effing Alma mater glorified building takeovers from the 1960s, talking about the good changes that eventually developed, but then they changed from being a “security” force trying to protect the kids to a “police” force so they can carry guns and arrest kids. Then during the BLM demonstrations they started arresting kids and kicking them out. WTF.
Seriously. The rule should be, “occupy whatever the hell you want. Just don’t create a fire hazard or prevent people from doing their job.” Want to sit-in on the hallway outside the university president’s office? Fine. Just keep the number small enough to not be a fire hazard. Feel free to shout whatever you want at them while they walk to their door. Don’t do anything stupid like chaining yourself to the university president, and you’ll be fine.
Yeah, it would be a bit annoying to be that president and to have to walk past protesters during terms. But so what? You signed up to be the president of the university, the human face of the campus administration. You’re the highest paid person on campus, behind only the football coach. Don’t want to deal with blue haired teenagers shouting at you? Don’t sign up to be a university president!
Maybe smartphones and social media are a problem here. Running around buttnaked with penises drawn to you face isn’t that fun anymore, if everyone can take a picture/video that might haunt you for decades. It’s self-surveillance.
The one thing I wish europeans would mimic from the USA.
On the one hand, cigarettes are bad and everyone should quit. And alcohol should be used in moderation. And many drugs are very dangerous and addictive and should be avoided. So this is probably good.
On the other hand, if this means are just sitting home alone, maybe having parasocial relationships with influencers, that’s sad.
Teenagers going out to party - bad
Teenagers sitting at home - also bad.
What the hell are kids supposed to do? Just not exist from the period where we stop finding them cute till adulthood?
Going out to party isn’t bad. Sitting at home using drugs and alcohol compulsively because you are addicted is bad. It’s a fine line to walk but lots of people do it. I did every drug under the sun as a youth and turned out fine, and this applies to pretty much my entire university cohort. Not a single one of them ended up as a junkie.
Should we encourage kids to drink and do drugs? I don’t know tbh. That experience was genuinely positive for me because it gets me out there in the world, made me friends and memories and taught me lessons about moderation. From my point of view the people who ended up getting the shit end of the stick were the handful of people I know who got addicted to WoW and online gambling, not the one who did drugs on occasion. But apparently those things are becoming common and culturally acceptable while partying isn’t. Take that as you will.
For my kid who is very athletic, I always phrased it as “don’t destroy your cardio by inhaling any ashes or burning stuff”
But he is so strait laced and so careful with his health that it’s not really an issue.
My other kid is a different story. Luckily he doesn’t like the smell of cigarettes or pot smoke, but I found out his vice when he offered me a gummy. First: cool, second: shit, I was supposed to yell at you
You can go out to party without doing heroin.
Sure if you want to be lame
Not born.
Already being worked on. Fertility rates are below replacement rate and keep dropping.
Well…yeah. Have you SEEN this world??? I don’t want to bring new kids into this awful planet. Do YOU???
Sports, Music, Hobbies like board games, Outdoor activities like camping and hiking.
There is plenty of fulfilling things to do together that dont involve alcohol or other drugs or “partying” in the sense of loud music, bad hookups and regrettable videos the next day.
Why do you single out alcohol as “should be used in moderation”? It’s literally a hard drug and way worse than cigarettes.
Does “hard drug” have an agreed upon definition?
I’m pretty sure cigarettes are worse. Much more addictive, harmful to the user and nearby people, and the cigarette butts I think are an environmental hazard.
Alcohol use is as old as human civilization. I don’t think light usage is that hazardous.
TLDR: Alcohol is a psychoactive, addictive carcinogen that will give you cancer no matter the consumption (though of course the more you drink the worse it becomes). It’ll also fuck up your liver, but that’s not mentioned in this article as it focuses on cancer.
That aside, where did you get that cigarettes are more addictive than alcohol? Only one of these will literally kill you if you quit cold turkey unprepared and it’s not cigarettes.
Most people I’ve known who smoke are addicted. They get moody and other withdrawal symptoms. No one I know has a similar relationship with alcohol. This is not a scientific study, but that’s been my experience. I know there are alcoholics in the world.
Also nicotine and cigarettes are known to be addictive https://nida.nih.gov/publications/research-reports/tobacco-nicotine-e-cigarettes/nicotine-addictive
I’m pretty sure “stopping drinking cold turkey will kill you” is kind of hyperbolic. Most people aren’t drinking that heavily. This thread started on the point of moderate drinking.
I acknowledge that even light drinking is unsafe. I wasn’t aware it that plausibly that hazardous. Unfortunately, many things are unsafe and I don’t think alcohol is going away any time soon. Going out for a drink with friends, there’s probably a bunch of hazards there. Unhealthy foods, car exhaust, staying up late.
Hopefully they’re just smoking weed instead of drugs
Their tick talking and vaping
Of course better education and all that stuff becoming super expensive makes it much less desirable.
Gaming and social media is the new addiction.
I’m 41, and my cousin has young teens. I asked “Do kids today even play video games?”
And she said “Not in the way you would think. It’s not about playstation or nintendo. It’s about cell phones and tablets.”
Which made me sad. App gaming is laaaaaame.
I hope that’s just your experience - being relegated to mobile games would be sad. I mean I’m addicted too but I recognize they’re just a time and attention waster.
My older teens are pretty avid gamers as are their friends. One of them started a gaming club at his school! They’re such great kids they sometimes let their Mom or me join a party, and they don’t laugh too hard. But seriously, that’s how they socialize ever since COViD. They’ll spend the entire night in a group chat, listening to music, sometimes teaming up sometimes not, just playing video games and spending time with friends. It works
So bad. It can’t be very good for developing brains either… Video games can be great for developing things like motor functioning and abstract reasoning, and so much of that is lost with the mindlessness of mobile gaming.
App gaming is laaaaaame.
desktops/laptops, ps5, and Xbox all use apps.
This must be why “there’s an app for that” is a phrase that’s been around forever and has nothing to do with the proliferation of mobile devices, i.e. iPhone.
I think he meant mobile gaming, like angry birbs and raid shadow candy crunch.
Considering the article specifies that drugs, alcohol, and tobacco are “social” activities, I think this makes sense. It’s not good that kids are shifting to solitary activities
Gaming is very much a social activity.
Try finding a triple A game released in the last 10 years that hasnt been heavily designed around multiplayer.
It hasnt been until indie games have really caught on, perhaps as a result of the shift towards open world multiplayer gaming that now dominates, that there is still a market for those types of games.
I know multiple married people that used gaming to connect with each other when they had to be apart.
I was actually on one of those married couples first date because they played league of legends, and that was how I even knew them.
Try finding a triple A game released in the last 10 years that hasnt been heavily designed around multiplayer
What? In 2024 alone, would you say games like Alan Wake 2, Baldurs Gate 3 or Elden Ring are “heavily designed around multiplayer”?
Sure you have your FIFA’s and CoD and a bunch of other MP games, but single player games are still a thing.
And honestly, my understanding is that the multiplayer games aren’t very social: they’re almost always using ranked but otherwise random matchmaker settings that mean instead of socializing and getting to know people, you meet your single serving friends and then barely ever see them again.
Depends on the game… I used to play Overwatch, years ago, with a handful of friends regularly, and it was most certainly a social experience.
It’s solitary social activity. Going out and seeing real people can’t be compared to a night gaming. The fact that people don’t see each other is actually a very bad thing because it could be a sign of greater depression and loneliness
Sorry but that’s like saying social media isnt a social activity. Yes there is s variety of ways to engage with it, but it is something that is causing people to connect with others from a distance.
Its also like saying long distance relationships arent real relationships which would be a ridiculous thing to claim
I believe social media isn’t a social activity because you are laying down on your bed typing on your phone chasing likes and replies. And also comparing a long distance relationship to an in-person one is ridiculous. They are completely different because you are not talking to a person, you are talking to a screen. There is absolutely no comparison to be made between online social activities and real life ones. Talking or gaming online is absolutely different from going out with friends at a chalet for a weekend and it’s a ridiculous thing to say they are similar
We are at an en passe then as we have fundamentally different perspectives on socializing
Try finding a triple A game released in the last 10 years that hasnt been heavily designed around multiplayer.
cyberpunk 2077
Thats one example, my point is only that there arent many titles, not that they dont exist
This. There is no decline at all, I assume. Just an extreme switch to something even more powerful.
Yeah as much as this is good news, I think it’s just a sign of changes that have come in the digital age. Young people go out less in general, because their social life is all online. This is probably safer for them at the end of the day - less driving and less access to substances through friends. But still… the fact that young people are glued to their screens all the time is disturbing. Their lives may be longer, but what is the point of living when all you do is sit inside and consume social media?
