Teens Smoke Less Cigarettes But More Marijuana

Monitoring the Future typically asks teenagers from around 400 public and private schools in the US to offer honest answers to tough questions by enuring that the data is anonymized. These surveys often cover as many as 47,000 students. However, the latest survey only managed to include data from 11,800 students — data collection was cut short by the COVID-19 pandemic.

That begs an interesting question. How has the pandemic itself affected drug use among teenagers, who have all suffered through periods of lockdown that might have left them incredibly bored, but also potentially less able to access drugs?

Here's an overview of the important survey's key findings:

• Marijuana use hasn't declined; 11.4 percent of 8th graders, 28 percent of 10th graders, and 35.2 percent of 12th graders reported that they used cannabis at some point over the last 12 months. Daily use is fairly uncommon, though. Just over one percent of 8th graders use cannabis every day, while 6.9 percent of 12th graders do the same.
• By now, we all know that old-fashioned cigarettes have gone out of style and vaping has taken over. Many students continue to abuse nicotine by vaping. By 8th grade, just over 16 percent of teenagers will have tried vaping, and 34.5 percent of 12th graders have vaped nicotine in the past year. However, there's also some good news. In 2020, daily nicotine vaping rates went down significantly from 2018. 
• Vaping is also now one of the most popular ways for teenagers to consume cannabis, and parents, teachers, and community leaders should be aware of this. The fact that 8.1 percent of 8th graders, 19.1 percent of 10th graders, and 22.1 percent of 12th graders admit to vaping marijuana in the last year does show that it hasn't become the only way to use weed, though. "Dabbing" cannabis concentrates is a new, stronger, and potentially incredibly dangerous way to use marijuana that the older generations should also have on their radar.
• Over half of 12th graders report that they've consumed alcohol in the last year, along with nearly a quarter of their peers in grade 8. However, binge drinking is fast becoming uncool. Compared to previous years, alcohol abuse in teenagers has declined steeply.
• Teenagers are also increasingly turning to more unlikely drugs, specifically cough medicine and so-called inhalants. The latter are common household substances such as spray paints and event deodorants, which can be used to get high. The use of both these categories of drugs is up compared to 2018. 

Perceived Risk of Regular Marijuana Use has Decreased among Students

Because Monitoring the Future surveys are conducted regularly, interesting trends have the chance to emerge. Since the survey's inception, alcohol and nicotine have both decreased in popularity, while cannabis has become the drug of choice. 

Things have changed here as well, though. In 2012, for instance, Monitoring the Future showed that marijuana use among teenagers reached an all time high. In that year, one in every fifteen students in high school used marijuana on a daily basis and 36.4% of all 12th graders reported smoking marijuana in past one year while 6.6% were found to be using it daily. Even students of class 8 were using marijuana.

According to experts, this popularity was largely caused by the fact that the perceived risk of regular marijuana use has decreased among students. Unlike cigarette smoking and alcohol use, they do not find marijuana to be responsible for any long lasting side effects. With an increased focus on medical marijuana, the students feel that when it can be given to patients, it obviously cannot be very harmful. Moreover, medical marijuana is legal in an ever-increasing number of states and can be easily obtained on a medical card.

Students know that medical marijuana can be obtained on the pretext of conditions like chronic pain and migraine and this easy accessibility has also played an important part in its frequent abuse by teenagers.

Synthetic marijuana, better known as “Spice” or “K2” has also become immensely popular among students. It has been used by one in every nine high school students in the last year. Apart from marijuana, other products like “bath salts” are also being used by the students to give them a high.

However, since 2012, marijuana use has declined some — and students are finding novel and more discrete ways of abusing the drug. Despite the pandemic, teenagers who did want to use marijuana, nicotine, or alcohol seemed to have no trouble getting their hands on it. This should lead us all to wonder where they are accessing these drugs.