Risk and Protective Factors

In more than 20 years of drug abuse research, has identified important principles for prevention programs in the family, school, and community. Prevention programs often are designed to enhance "protective factors" and to reduce "risk factors." Protective factors are those associated with reduced potential for drug use. Risk factors are those that make drug use more likely. Research has shown that many of the same factors apply to other behaviors such as youth violence, delinquency, school dropout, risky sexual behaviors, and teen pregnancy.

Protective factors:

• strong and positive family bonds;
• parental monitoring of children's activities and peers;
• clear rules of conduct that are consistently enforced within the family;
• involvement of parents in the lives of their children;
• success in school performance; strong bonds with institutions, such as school and religious organizations; and
• adoption of conventional norms about drug use.

What is risk Factors

Roughly 10% of all people who experiment with drugs become addicted. A combination of environmental and genetic factors influence the likelihood of addiction.

Environmental risk factors are characteristics in a person's surroundings that increase their likelihood of becoming addicted to drugs. A person may have many environments, or domains, of influence such as the community, family, school and friends. Their risk of addiction can develop in any of these domains.

Risk factors:

• chaotic home environments, particularly in which parents abuse substances or suffer from mental illnesses;
• ineffective parenting, especially with children with difficult temperaments or conduct disorders;
• lack of parent-child attachments and nurturing;
• inappropriately shy or aggressive behavior in the classroom;
• failure in school performance;
• poor social coping skills;
• affiliations with peers displaying deviant behaviors; and
• perceptions of approval of drug-using behaviors in family, work, school, peer, and community environments.

The Community Domain

An individual's connection with the community in which they live plays a big part in their liklihood of abusing drugs. Statistics show that if a person's community has favorable attitudes toward drug use, firearms and crime, their risk is increased.

The availability of firearms contributes to drug abuse risk.

Low neighborhood attachment and community disorganization.

The peer Domain

The single biggest contributing factor to drug abuse risk is having friends who engage in the problem behavior. If an individual's friends have favorable attitudes towards drug use, this can also increase risk.

The difficulty of "finding new friends".

The Family Domain

Family conflict and home management problems are contributing factors in drug abuse risk. Also, if parents have favorable attitudes towards drug use or use drugs themselves, often their children will be more likely to abuse drugs.

While divorce alone doesn't increase risk, family conflict does.

Family transition and mobility can contribute to risk.

The School Domain

A student's performance, participation and commitment to school can be a major risk factor in addiction.

Academic failure beginning in late elementary school increases risk.

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