The Social Contextual Approach and Rural Adolescent Substance Use: Implications for Prevention in Rural Settings

Adolescents in rural areas use substances at rates comparable to urban adolescents; understanding causes of rural adolescent substance use is critical if prevention efforts are to succeed. The present review has three primary goals: (1) to define rural, (2) to evaluate the empirical evidence regarding correlates and causes of rural adolescent substance use from a social contextual framework (L. V. Scaramella, R. D. Conger, R. Spoth, & R. L. Simons, in press), and (3) to discuss the malleability of theoretically based risk or protective factors in rural settings. The review concludes with a discussion of the difficulties and challenges of implementing prevention programs in rural areas.     

Psychiatric disorders and the use of mental health services among children involved in bullying

This study had two aims: to evaluate the relationship between bullying and psychiatric disorders and to study the probability of using mental health services among children involved in bully/victim problems. The data consisted of interviews with 423 parents and 420 children. Diagnostic measures were based on the Isle of Wight Interview. Children involved in bullying as bullies, bully‐victims, and victims were compared with other children. Children involved in bully/victim problems were more prone to have psychiatric disorders than noninvolved children. The probability of being disturbed was highest among male bullies, followed by male bully‐victims and female victims (9.5‐fold, 7.9‐fold, and 4.3‐fold, respectively) compared with noninvolved same‐sex children. The most common diagnoses among children involved in bully/victim problems were attention deficit disorder, oppositional/conduct disorder, and depression. Furthermore, children involved in bully/victim problems were more likely to have used mental health services at some time during their lives and also during the previous 3 months. Special attention should be paid to children’s mental health when dealing with bullying problems at school. Referral pathways to mental health services and factors affecting the referral processes among children should be further studied. Aggr. Behav. 27:102–110, 2001. © 2001 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.     

Problem Solvers Adjust Cognitive Offloading Based on Performance Goals

When incorporating the environment into mental processing (cf., cognitive offloading), one creates novel cognitive strategies that have the potential to improve task performance. Improved performance can, for example, mean faster problem solving, more accurate solutions, or even higher grades at university.¹ Although cognitive offloading has frequently been associated with improved performance, it is yet unclear how flexible problem solvers are at matching their offloading habits with their current performance goals (can people improve goal‐related instead of generic performance, e.g., when being in a hurry and aiming for a “quick and dirty” solution?). Here, we asked participants to solve a cognitive task, provided them with different goals—maximizing speed (SPD) or accuracy (ACC), respectively—and measured how frequently (Experiment 1) and how proficiently (Experiment 2) they made use of a novel external resource to support their cognitive processing. Experiment 1 showed that offloading behavior varied with goals: Participants offloaded less in the SPD than in the ACC condition. Experiment 2 showed that this differential offloading behavior was associated with high goal‐related performance: fast answers in the SPD, accurate answers in the ACC condition. Simultaneously, goal‐unrelated performance was sacrificed: inaccurate answers in the SPD, slow answers in the ACC condition. The findings support the notion of humans as canny offloaders who are able to successfully incorporate their environment in pursuit of their current cognitive goals. Future efforts should be focused on the finding's generalizability, for example, to settings without feedback or with high mental workload.     

Relevance and argumentation: How bald can you get

This paper is concerned with vagueness in language, its relation to logico-philosophical questions on the one hand, and to so-called syncategorematic terms and their linguistic use on the other hand. It attempts to show that it is not language itself which is vague but rather the way we use it.     

Sober adolescence–Predictor of psychosocial maladjustment in young adulthood?

We have explored how age at first intoxication with alcohol relates to mental health, social integration and adjustment to the adult role. The data stem from a longitudinal representative study of 2000 Norwegians. The sample was assessed at ages 19–22, 21–24 and 25–28. Among females, only early intoxication was related to young adult symptoms of poor mental health. A U-shaped association between intoxication debut and psychological problems was revealed among males, implying that both early and late beginners had more such problems than those who had followed the mainstream. These associations persisted without change over time. However, males who remained abstainers in adulthood were psychologically healthy, but they showed indications of a delayed entry into the adult role. Male late beginners were also somewhat reluctant to adopt adult role-behaviors. Thus, getting drunk for the first time in mid-adolescence seems to be an ingredient in the normal developmental process in young males.     

Mobilizing positive reinforcement in communities to reduce youth access to tobacco

A community intervention to mobilize positive reinforcement for not selling tobacco to young people was evaluated. The intervention had five components: (a) mobilization of community support, (b) merchant education, (c) changing consequences to clerks for selling or not selling to those under 18, (d) publicity about clerks’ refusals to sell, and (e) feedback to store owners or managers about the extent of their sales to adolescents. A multiple baseline design experiment was conducted, in which two small Oregon communities received the intervention, while two others continued in baseline. Outlets’ willingness to sell was assessed repeatedly by teenage volunteers. The intervention significantly reduced the proportion of stores willing to sell. Mobilizing socia and material reinforcement for stores not selling tobacco to young people is a viable means of reducing such sales. It may be especially valuable in communities where laws against sales to minors go unenforced. This paper supported in part by the National Cancer Institute Grant CA38273.     

Whorf and Wittgenstein. Language, world view and argumentation

Whorf and Wittgenstein are perhaps the most famous names in linguistics and philosophy associated with the assumption that language plays a decisive role in shaping our view of reality. After a critical discussion of Whorf's linguistic relativity principle I conclude that it is not language as a system, but the use of language according to the rules of language games which connects language thought and world view, especially if some particular usage becomes the commonly accepted norm. This traditional norm also enters argumentative discourse in the form of background assumptions occuring in the premises of arguments. Thus, traditional points of view and prevailing ideologies in a society, even if challenged in discussions, can become reinforced and stabilized. This is illustrated with a critical analysis of the role and function of tautological utterances in argumentative discourse, which only apparently are compelling means of argumentation.     

Alcohol use and stress in women: The role of prior vs. anticipated stressors

The present study investigated stress-related drinking in women. Alcohol consumption in response to stress and in anticipation of a stressor was examined to evaluate women's use of alcohol to cope with stress. Subjects were assigned to one of four conditions in a 2 × 2 factorial design in which order of alcohol consumption and stress task as well as stress level was manipulated. Findings indicate that subjects did not consume alcohol to cope with the effects of either a prior stressor or an upcoming stressor. These results suggest the need for further refinement of notions concerning women's use of alcohol to cope with stress.     

Suicidal behavior among youth with severe emotional disturbance

The purpose of this study was to replicate an investigation of risk behaviors associated with suicidal behavior in public high school students, in a population of high school age youth with severe emotional disturbance (SED). Subjects for the study were clients of the South Carolina Continuum of Care (COC) (N=83). Information on suicidal thoughts and acts, aggressive behaviors, substance use and physical recklessness was gathered using a modified version of the self-report National Youth Risk Behavior Survey. Four percent of the youth reported seriously considering suicide, 8% reported planning how they would attempt suicide, 10% reported actually attempting suicide at least once, and 6% reported attempts requiring medical treatment Of the 13 youth who reported attempting suicide, four (31%) did not report planning an attempt. All suicidal behaviors except thoughts occurred more in girls than boys with SED. Alcohol and illicit drug use were associated with suicidal behavior, with larger odds ratios for attempts than for thoughts/plans. Youth with SED who use alcohol and illicit substances are particularly at risk of suicidal behavior. A high index of suspicion is appropriate when evaluating suicidal risk in girls with SED, especially in the presence of known alcohol or substance use.Continuum of Care for Emotionally Disturbed Children Division, S. C. Office of the Governor.     

Patterns of drug use and criminal activities among latino arrestees in California: Treatment and policy implications

This study examined the patterns of drug use and criminal activities among Latino arrestees. The findings indicate that while the prevalence of drug use at time of arrest, and in the prior 12 months were significantly lower for Latinos compared to Whites and Blacks, drug use still is of concern for this ethnic group. Almost 50% of Latinos reported drug use in the last year, and more importantly, they were more likely to report using dangerous drugs such as cocaine, heroin, and PCP than any other ethnic group. These findings are even more alarming considering that, for the most part, Latino drug users were treatment-naive, and that less than half perceived a need for drug treatment. Regarding criminal activities, Latinos were less likely to have a history of prior arrests and to have been arrested in the year prior to the interview than any other ethnic group. Interestingly, those immigrants who have resided in the U.S. for less than 1 year were significantly more likely to have been charged with drug-related crimes. U.S. born Latinos were more likely to have been arrested for property crimes, while Central American immigrants were more likely than any other Latino group to have been arrested for violent and domestic violence crimes. Treatment and policy implications of these findings are discussed.