War on Some Drugs?

July 19, 2005 7:34 AM

"Kids are less likely to do drugs if you ask them where they are going, what time they are going to return, and if adults will be present."

I hear this on NPR about twice a day. My sister and I make fun of it religiously. She'll be leaving with her friends, and I'll yell down the stairs "Are adults going to be present?!"

We both have a hearty laugh, and then she leaves. Who came up with this statement, and how is it being broadcast with any degree of seriousness? Is there actually a study to back up the assertion?

I don't understand how any of the three components of that question have anything to do with whether your child does drugs. For example, "I'm going to Stephen's house [to do drugs], I'll be back at 11. Stephen's mom is there."

posted by odinsdream to human relations (34 comments total)

i think some people just ignore their kids pretty much. giving them some basic rules to follow probably isn't going to change much, but it might help build some kind of communication. and presumably the problem is parent/child communication rather than "drugs" per se.
posted by andrew cooke at 7:53 AM on July 19, 2005

Why don't you just follow the link to the organization that NPR is advertising? It's this one, no?
posted by Pollomacho at 7:56 AM on July 19, 2005

I'm sure it's rooted in a causation versus correlation fallacy. Parents who are generally more involved in their children's lives are more likely to ask these sorts of questions. Children who who have more involved parents are less likely to get high all the time.
posted by Galvatron at 7:56 AM on July 19, 2005

I don't understand how any of the three components of that question have anything to do with whether your child does drugs. For example, "I'm going to Stephen's house [to do drugs], I'll be back at 11. Stephen's mom is there."

People think that Stephen's mom will prevent the opportunity for drug use to happen. We're not talking about Stephen's mom preventing them from ever doing drugs, just in this one instance, assuming the children are in a controlled environment.

Or, it could just be choosing to be ignorant because it makes you feel better. Either way.
posted by dflemingdotorg at 7:57 AM on July 19, 2005

If you can figure out who exactly is running the ad, they should have a website with sourcing. For instance, the Office of National Drug Abuse Policy.
posted by smackfu at 7:58 AM on July 19, 2005

also sets a standard for the children to what kind of question a parent might ask. makes such questions culturally acceptable. which again might make comminucation easier.
posted by andrew cooke at 7:58 AM on July 19, 2005

why is it a causation v correlation fallacy? life is complicated. communication is hard. forcing yourself to smile actually makes you happier. in a complex system with arbitrary feedback, distinguishing between cause and effect is hopelessly naive.
posted by andrew cooke at 8:00 AM on July 19, 2005

Never stopped me from doing drugs.

The worst example of this meme is an ad I heard on Air America. The kid wants to go to the park after school, but the mom doesn't let her because she might do drugs.

Instead, I guess the kid just sits inside all day and eats cheetos.
posted by furiousxgeorge at 8:00 AM on July 19, 2005

in a complex system with arbitrary feedback, distinguishing between cause and effect is hopelessly naive.

I think that's the point I was trying to make. The fact that these questions are asked is probably not a major cause for children staying off drugs. But it probably correlates well with a "healthy" parent-child relationship, which in turn correlates well with children staying off drugs.
posted by Galvatron at 8:09 AM on July 19, 2005

...or maybe andrew is pointing out that there's really no fallacy in the statement as written--it's just a statement about conditional probabilities, which is undoubtedly well-supported by various studies. The fallacy is in the implication that parents watching the commercial can change this small aspect of behavior and hope to create a change in their children's behavior as a result. (At least, I would argue that such an implication exists. Commercials are there to persuade people, after all.)
posted by Galvatron at 8:47 AM on July 19, 2005

Yes, that is an ad placed by the ONDCP.
posted by waldo at 9:17 AM on July 19, 2005

Another fallacy in these commercials is the assumption that the kid will always tell the truth about where he/she is going and whether parents will be present.

My own parents assumed that unless parents were around, I would turn into some kind of crack whore. Perhaps the fact that I did not turn into a crack whore reinforced their belief that they raised me right.
posted by elisabeth r at 9:28 AM on July 19, 2005

This reminds me of people who value extra-curricular activities for children in terms of the reduction in teenage pregnancies, which seems (on the face of it) like a huge non-sequitur. "Oh if we teach the kids how to row kayaks they won't have as many babies! Yay!"

If the ads are really about parental involvement in a child's life, why don't they say that directly instead of "Kids are less likely to use drugs if you ask them if they have clean underwear on"
posted by sandking at 9:34 AM on July 19, 2005

What if Stephanie's mom is a dealer?
posted by realcountrymusic at 10:01 AM on July 19, 2005

I'd be more worried about my kids smoking tobacco then pot, if I had any. Which I don't. But still.
posted by delmoi at 10:03 AM on July 19, 2005

What if Stephanie's mom is a dealer?

Actualy when I was a kid some of my dad's neighbors in texas would smoke pot with their stepmom. They were like 12 or 13 or something.
posted by delmoi at 10:04 AM on July 19, 2005

Growing up, my parents always asked me these questions when I was going out. Almost word-for-word. I never did drugs. I'm not implying causation, but, hey there's evidence of some anecdotal correlation.
posted by Plutor at 10:06 AM on July 19, 2005

My parents never asked me these questions, often assumed I was hiding something -- usually a drinking habit or a secret boyfriend -- and I was a complete goody two shoes who never did anything more exciting as a teenager than go see R-rated movies.
posted by croutonsupafreak at 10:24 AM on July 19, 2005

My parents always asked these questions, but my parents and I actually, I don't know, talked on occasion. It's unfortunately easier to say, "Ask your kid where he's going," than it is to say, "Get your head out of your self-absorbed yuppie ass and get to know your kids as people."

I didn't, and haven't, done drugs to this day, by the way, other than drinking. Everyone I knew who smoked pot as a habit seemed to have very shitty lives. It didn't make pot-smoking, or LSD, or anything else seem anything but stupid. Other people have had other experiences, of course, but that was my perception.
posted by Medieval Maven at 10:41 AM on July 19, 2005

Yes, anti-drug are dumb, dumb, dumb and don't directly prevent drug use. And kids will always mock them unmercifully. But the one good thing about all these ads is that they do provide parents with some different ideas as to how they might speak with the alien teenage creatures in their household.

For example, we've got:
* Prep For An Argument Mom And Dad: "it's JUST a little POT!!"
* Logic Demonstration By Tough-Tender Mom: I don't eat that stuff -- sure you do, every time you smoke one of THESE. (pack of cigarettes)
* Your Kids Are Good But Stay Involved To Keep Them That Way: The above ad. I particularly like the one with the freak kid.
posted by desuetude at 10:44 AM on July 19, 2005

Best advice the site can give any parents:

PARENTS: DO NOT UNDERESTIMATE THE ABILITIES OF YOUR TEENAGER.
posted by rabbitsnake at 11:20 AM on July 19, 2005

I guess the central fallacy is that drugs are inherently bad... Of course, I was raised by liberals who had done more drugs than I ever really wanted to get into, so maybe my values are skewed.
posted by klangklangston at 11:32 AM on July 19, 2005

I find that the foolishness and inaccuracy of some anti-drug ads ruins the effectiveness of accurate programs to promote heathy decisions.

I also find that paying a lot of attention to what my teenager is up to is my job as a parent. I hope it helps him make better informed choices, not make a baby too soon, not drink and drive, or otherwise abuse alcohol, not use pot and drive or otherwise abuse pot, and not use methamphetamine and other really stupid drugs, etc.

The ads all seem to not realize that kids are home all day while we're at work.

Can I piggyback and ask about the Ecstasy commercial - I bought glowstick earrings for a teenager - am I promoting drug abuse? I thought they were pretty entertaining. If I had pierced ears, I'd wear them for special occasions.
posted by theora55 at 11:38 AM on July 19, 2005

My father would not let me leave the house without a long series of these questions, also including, "Oh, it's a party? Who's going to be there?", and I would have to try and name my all of my friends I thought were going. Some effects of this:
It is harder to lie constantly if you know they are going to ask.
If you feel like they are paying attention, you don't want them to think you are a screw-up, so you either have to make up really complex lies or just not do so much bad stuff.
I still drank and went to parties, but they always knew where to find me if something bad had happened.
posted by slimslowslider at 12:01 PM on July 19, 2005

I think I made a mistake in the way I worded my question. Where's the actual evidence that saying these magic words leads to less drug use? The anti-drug sites are full of pretty words and anectdotal evidence, but I'm interested in an actual study, if one exists. Does it?

I'd fully believe that simply being involved with your children will make them more likely to listen to your opinion, and if your opinion is anti-drug, they're more likely to be anti-drug as a result, but that's not what the commercial is saying, which is where my complaint comes from. Galvatron mentions this: "The fallacy is in the implication that parents watching the commercial can change this small aspect of behavior and hope to create a change in their children's behavior as a result."

The commercial doesn't even go into what the answers to the three questions should be. What if the kid says adults won't be present? This instills an "Oh god what now! The commercial didn't cover this!" paranoia, it seems.
posted by odinsdream at 12:02 PM on July 19, 2005

I can atest to the fact that my immediate friends would be asked these questions and do all kinds of drugs, but did it safer! It really promoted smarter drug and alcohol use, not preventing it. I never knew how parents never found out about their kids with large coke or pot habits. How is a kid under 21 spending $200-300 a weekend? I think financial transactions are a much greater quantifier of a person in trouble. Maybe they should check into "watch your kid's back account" and "don't give your kid several thousand in month to spend."
posted by geoff. at 12:14 PM on July 19, 2005

These programs have been evaluated by Westat, and you can download the evaluation data and conduct your own analyses if you want.

Or, you can just read the reports - from the 2003 executive summary the bottom line is that people recall the campaign messages, some changes in beliefs and attitudes occurred among parents (but not in monitoring behavior), but...

There is little evidence of direct favorable Campaign effects on youth, either for the Marijuana
Initiative period or for the Campaign as whole. The trend data in marijuana use is not favorable,
and for the primary target audience, 14- to 16-year-olds, past year use increased from 2000 through
2003, although this increase was already in place before the start of the Marijuana Initiative.
However, an independent source of trend information, the Monitoring the Future Survey, showed a
decline in use for some age groups. In any case, youth who were more exposed to Campaign
messages are no more likely to hold favorable beliefs or intentions about marijuana than are youth
less exposed to those messages, both during the Marijuana Initiative period and over the entire
course of the Campaign.

posted by jasper411 at 12:14 PM on July 19, 2005

The ad doesn't say "Your kids will 100% never do drugs or anything bad if you ask them where they are going", it just says that there are some very simple things you can do to both reduce the likelihood that they might do drugs as well as open up a channel of communication.

Assigning the idea that asking those questions alone will prevent all bad from happening is a silly straw man, so why tear it down?

The answer to the question could be anything. It could be "I'm going to a party, and there is going to be drinking" Then the parental response could be "You're not going" or it could be "don't get in the car with anyone who is drunk and call me at any time of the night if you need a ride".

By opening up communication, your kid doesn't have to first explain that they snuck out, and then that they need help. You can work on the help thing first, then deal with helping them make better choices later.

The real fallacy is thinking that there is no benefit in talking to your kids.
posted by jonah at 12:19 PM on July 19, 2005

The ad... says that there are some very simple things you can do to both reduce the likelihood that they might do drugs as well as open up a channel of communication.

But my guess is that this statement is unproven; I'm having difficulty imagining an experiment that could demonstrate this to anyone's satisfaction. There is most likely a study that says, "A random set of parents who ask their children these questions is more likely to have children who stay off drugs." Which is not an equivalent statement.

(I won't argue with the "channel of communication" part, since it's something of a tautology.)
posted by Galvatron at 12:48 PM on July 19, 2005

It is better for a parent to know where his child is going, who he going to be with, and the general environment that he will be in (home, BBQ, pizza joing, parents, etc) than it is for a kid to simply say "I'm going out" and nothing else. While this is not a fool-proof anti-drug strategy, it sure as hell can't hurt.
posted by davidmsc at 5:52 PM on July 19, 2005

This is propaganda by people that believe they are entitled, aimed at people they believe are not so bright. As for any statistical evidence it's all handpicked or "discredited", there's so much history and politics involved that I wouldn't trust any single source if I were you. Read and research and draw your own conclusions is all i can say. Take a dip here or elsewhere. All i'm saying is that this is one of those things that is always framed in terms of something else. An indicator of social ill, a group you want to target politically, whatever.

But seriously, when I hear these commercials the apparent increase in kids snapping and going nuts starts making a lot of sense. If they treated me in high school the way they are treating kids today in *my high school* it would have driven me absolutely nuts, and this has nothing to do with my behavior, merely how *they*'ve decided kids should be treated now. (Much different since 1995).

It's amazing how quickly we forget: our youth.
posted by 31d1 at 6:38 PM on July 19, 2005

That link above is as bullshitty as most, but it at least adresses some of the history.
posted by 31d1 at 7:11 PM on July 19, 2005

The ad doesn't say "Your kids will 100% never do drugs or anything bad if you ask them where they are going"

...a silly straw man, so why tear it down?

I quoted the ad as exactly as I could without having the text in front of me. I never claimed there was 100% compliance, and I don't think anyone else in the thread did. The ad says kids are "less likely," and I'm interested in the information behind this claim. I'm not necessarily looking to debunk this claim, I'm looking for some answer besides "They made it up because it's one of those feel-good common sense things."
posted by odinsdream at 7:25 PM on July 19, 2005

Personally anecdotal, my parents asked this stuff all the time. It did reduce my drug/alcohol use (not eliminate, but reduce -- the 'less likely' claim held true). Here's how:

1. Indicated to me that they were aware of and had interest in my activities
2. Indicated to me that they were aware of the prevalence of drugs and alcohol in my social world
3. Indicated to me that they were concerned about the potential negative effects of drug/alcohol use -- which are real for teenagers, even if you are a proponent of drugs. As a 16-year-old girl just becoming familiar with drugs and alcohol, you could find yourself in situations involving unwanted sexual activity, being stranded somewhere you don't want to be, getting more f*ed up than you wanted to be, developing a problem, being in a car with someone incapable of driving and being incapable of realizing it, etc. So even if you think drugs are a great idea in general, it's not so wise to just turn kids loose around intoxicants with no understanding that there are risks associated with these activities.
4. Required me to lie if I didn't want them to know the full story, which was awkward, uncomfortable, guilt-inducing, and, I'm sure, totally transparent.
5. Made me aware that if I showed signs of an inability to maturely handle any drug/alcohol activity in my life, they would notice and do something about it.

So yeah, having experienced it, I can say that these questions were directly responsible for reducing my drug and alcohol activity as a teenager. I did still drink and smoke pot - but rarely, when nobody was driving, in comfortable situations with people I knew, and when I could avoid going home sloshed and finding them waiting up. It meant that instead of going ape, I attached greater significance and accountability to my choice to use substances.

It's true that we're seeing correlation between caring parents and question asking. However, it's likely that there are many parents who care about these things but have ineffective ways of addressing their children. Yelling "Don't do drugs! I'll kill you if you come home drunk!" is ineffective. Saying nothing is ineffective. But hearing a simple, clear suggestion on an ad like this might give a parent the words they are struggling for.
posted by Miko at 8:37 PM on July 19, 2005