1

“Inside the Teen Brain: Is There an App for That?” Moderated by Emily Skor, Vice President of Communications and Executive Director of the CHPA Educational Foundation

September 29, 2015

PARENTSATTITUDE TOWARD BEHAVIOR

ACCESS to the

PRODUCT

TEENS AGES 14-19

Changing Teen AttitudesVia the drivers that impact their decision not to abuse

2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 20142

3

4

5

6

7

AVERAGE12th Grade10th Grade8th Grade

3.2%

5.4%

Abuse rates are the lowest they’ve been since we began tracking this behavior

DXM Abuse Mitigation SuccessesPrevalence of Teen-Reported Abuse

SOURCE: Monitoring the Future Study3

• Alka-Seltzer Plus Cold • Coricidin • Delsym • Dimetapp DM • Mucinex DM• Robitussin • Sudafed cough medicines

Products Containing DXM• TheraFlu • Triaminic• Tylenol Cough/Cold• Vicks Formula 44 • Vicks NyQuil and Dayquil • Zicam• Store brands

Slang Terms

Darby Fox, Child & Adolescent Family Therapist

Inside the Teen Brain

Myths of Teenage Activity• Myth: Raging hormones cause teenagers to “go crazy”.

• Myth: Teens just need to grow up. They are rebellious and

oppositional because they want to be difficult.

• Myth: Growing up requires shutting out your parents. They

are the enemy.

Four Activities of Adolescence

1. Novelty seeking

2. Social interaction

3. Heightened emotional intensity

4. Creative exploration

Figure: The Teenage Brain by Frances E. Jensen, MD with Amy Ellis Nutt (pg. 58)

The young brain has more excitatory synapsesthan inhibitory synapses.

Family Bonding“Family bonding is feelings of closeness and intimacy toward one’s parents, as measured by appraisals of communication, parental monitoring, parental involvement and joint family activities. Adolescents who use drugs regularly think that their parents do not care about their actions, and consequently, consider the family to be less important to them then their friends.” “Adolescent assessment of feeling close to mother and/or father, feeling cared about, loved and wanted by family members are important factors protecting against substance use and other health risk behaviors.”

Denton & Kampfe (1994) Kuendig and Kuntsche (2006) Resnick et al, 1997

Sean Clarkin, Executive Vice President of Research and External Relations

Preventing Teen Abuse of DXM

Contents• DXM abuse: Who? Why? How?• Prevention messaging • Arriving at a DXM prevention strategy

Who? Why? How?• DXM abuser is more likely to be male, 18-25 years old – though

initiation and early use occurs in teen years (12-17)• Polydrug / alcohol user – for whom DXM is a high of “last resort”, when

they can’t get anything else• Recreation to some extent – but also escape, self-medication• Not a “social drug” (like alcohol or weed); generally by oneself, or with

one or two friends

Prevalence• Relatively low prevalence – in 2011, when our DXM prevention

campaign began, 4.4% of teens in 8th, 10th and 12th grades (combined) reported abuse in the past year*

• About a third of teens reported having friends who abuse DXM (compared to 73% for marijuana)**

• Implication: Prevention messaging needs to be narrowly targeted to the potential abuser, in order to avoid educating “unexposed” kids

*Monitoring the Future 2011, U. of Michigan** Partnership Attitude Tracking Study 2011

Prevention Messaging • Tracking data going back to 1975 show that most important beliefs

correlating with teen substance use are perceptions of risk and “social disapproval”

• Experience shows that risk messaging has to be credible, and that disapproval has to focus more on the behavior and its consequences than on the user

• Peer to peer” messaging can be an effective way of being credible -- and respectful of the teen’s sense of self and his/her peer group

Getting to a DXM prevention strategy• Extensive qualitative research in 2011, in three different cities, probing teen (and parent) attitudes

and behaviors. Talked with teens who were familiar with DXM abuse; some had used / had friends who used

• Teens talked about the physical risks of DXM abuse as focused on the unpleasant consequences:– “Sloppy”– “Miserable high”– “Got sick and threw up”

• The social consequences they identified were related in important ways to these physical consequences:

– “Acting like jerks”– “Out of control”– “Nobody wants to be around them”

Getting to a DXM prevention strategy• We also tested a variety of risk and social disapproval messages (one or two

sentence “core concepts”) for credibility and persuasiveness• Challenging – because physical risks are not as severe as those for other drugs, such

as meth or prescription pain relievers• Zeroed in on message that combined risk (of nausea and vomiting) with social

disapproval: The friends I know who use cough medicine to get high get so sloppy--

throwing up and acting like jerks-- that nobody wants to be around them.

The Messaging Challenge• How to bring this strategy to life in a way that:

– Meets the target teen where he/she is (primarily online), but does not “spill” to unexposed kids

– Is credible– Is engaging, share-able with like-minded teens– Successfully influences those perceptions of risk and social disapproval that we

know correlate with early use

Kinney Edwards, Executive Creative Director

DXM Labworks

Kareemah Abdullah, Director of the National Community Anti-Drug Coalition Institute & Vice President of Training Operations

Agents of Change: Engaging Youth in Prevention

CADCA• Founded in 1992 as a recommendation from the President’s Drug

Advisory Council.• Today, CADCA supports a comprehensive, data-driven approach to

prevent the use of illicit drugs, underage drinking, youth tobacco use, and the abuse of medicines.

• CADCA represents more than 5,000 community coalitions nationally and in 22 countries globally.

CADCA & CHPA CollaboratePrevent Over-the-Counter Medicine Abuse

• Partners since 2006• CHPA is the cofounder and sponsor of National Medicine Abuse Awareness Month• CADCA 50 Challenge: Sparking community conversations in coalitions nationwide• Dose of Prevention Award recognizes coalition innovation in OTC medicine abuse

prevention• Training at CADCA’s National Leadership Forum• CADCA and coalitions support the Preventing Abuse of Cough Treatments (PACT)

Act

Building Current and Future Change Agents!

National Youth Leadership Initiative (NYLI)

Vision:A program of excellence to develop youth for effective

leadership in community coalitions.

Mission:To strengthen skills and capacity of youth to influence positive

community change through a strategic planning process.

Motto:“Youth led…Adult Guided”

NYLI Core Competencies

NYLI Core Competencies

The Social Development Model*

*Catalano, Hawkins, Kosterman and Newcomb (1996)

Empowerment Opportunities

Adapted from Search Institute’s 2005 Publication entitled “The Power of Youth and Adult Partnerships and Change Pathways for youth work”.

The Impact of the NYLIYouth trained by the NYLI experienced an increase and significant change in the following aptitudes:

• Leadership Competencies• Community Organizing• Problem-Solving Abilities• Current and Future Civic Activism• Civic and Political Engagement• Youth-Adult Partnerships

Foster-Fishman, Mortensen, Michigan State University (2010)

NYLI Impact on Youth Leadership, Attitudes, Skills & Actions