Characteristics of Teen Substance Users: A Data-Driven Learning Guide

Application

This exercise explores the characteristics of adolescent substance users using crosstabulation and bar charts.

In this exercise we focus on two measures of substance use which indicate how often the respondent drank more than a few sips of alcohol in the past 30 days (V106), and how often they used marijuana in the past 30 days (V114). We recoded both variables so that 0=never used, and 1=used. The new variables are called "DRINKMONTH" and "MARJMONTH."

Demographic Characteristics

First, consider substance use by respondent's sex and race. Look at the crosstab of alcohol use (DRINKMONTH) by sex (V150). Do males or females seem more likely to report alcohol use in the past 30 days? Also look at the crosstab of marijuana use (MARJMONTH) by sex (V150). Is the relationship between sex and substance use similar for both alcohol and marijuana?

Next, examine the relationship between alcohol use and race (responses were "Black," "White," and "Hispanic"). Look at the bar chart. Which racial group reports the lowest alcohol use in the past 30 days? Consider the relationship between marijuana use and race (V151). Again, look at the bar chart. Does marijuana use follow the same pattern as alcohol use among the racial groups?

Religiosity

Does substance use vary by religiosity? One important dimension of religiosity is frequency of religious attendance (V169). The question asked is "How often do you attend religious services?" The response options were: "never" (1); "rarely" (2); "1-2X/month" (3); and "1/week or more."

Look at the bar chart from the crosstab analysis of alcohol use by frequency of religious service attendance (V169). Do those who frequently attend religious services report less alcohol use? Do you observe a similar pattern when you look at the bar chart of marijuana use and frequency of attending religious services?

Another measure of religiosity is the importance of religion in one's life. Variable V170 contains respondents' answers to the question, "How important is religion in your life?" The possible responses were: "not important" (1); "a little important" (2); "pretty important" (3); and "very important" (4).

Look at the crosstab of alcohol use by importance of religion and the crosstab of marijuana use by importance of religion. Comparing the results for these two analyses as well as the two analyses using frequency of attendance as the measure of religiosity, do religious attendance and religious importance seem to have similar relationships to substance use?

Work

Next, consider the relationship between adolescent employment and substance use. To simplify the analysis, we recoded the responses to the question about how many hours the respondent worked per week (V191), collapsing the responses into four categories: Zero hours (1); 10 or fewer (but more than zero) hours (2); 11-20 hours (3); more than 20 hours (4). The new variable is called "WORKHOURS."

Compare the crosstab of alcohol use by WORKHOURS to the crosstab of marijuana use by WORKHOURS . Looking at the tables, does there seem to be a relationship between number of hours worked and substance use?

Aspirations for the Future

Finally, analyze the relationship between substance use and aspirations for the future. The dataset contains multiple measures of future aspirations. You will focus your analysis on aspirations for a 4-year college degree (v188) and aspirations for a military career (v181). For ease of analysis, we have recoded and relabeled these variables into dichotomous measures called "WANTDEGREE" and "WANTMIL," coded as "1" if the respondent aspired to that career path and "0" if not.

Consider the crosstab of alcohol use by WANTDEGREE . Does alcohol use vary by college aspirations? How big is the difference?

What about marijuana use ? Are adolescents with college aspirations more or less likely to have used marijuana than those without college aspirations?

Do you expect those with aspirations to join the military to be more, less, or equally likely to have consumed a drink in the past 30 days than those who do not aspire to join the military? Does the crosstab of alcohol use by WANTMIL support your hypothesis?

What about marijuana use? Do you feel that those with military aspirations are more, less, or equally likely to have used marijuana in the past 30 days than respondents who do not have military aspirations? Look at the crosstab of marijuana use by military aspirations. How do you interpret the difference?

Note: The online data analysis system (DAS) used on this site uses a system called Survey Documentation and Analysis (SDA), developed and maintained by the Computer-assisted Survey Methods Program (CSM) at the University of California, Berkeley. Documentation for DAS/SDA can be found on their Web site.

Goal & Concept - Dataset - Application - Interpretation & Summary - Bibliography