UNIVERSITY MENTAL HEALTH RESEARCH INSTITUTE
(UMHRI)
Panhellenic Survey for the Use of Addictive Substances by Students
Research ESPAD 2011
General Remarks
The aim of our presentation is to report the results of an official survey for the use of addictive substances by students aged between 15 to 19 years old. The survey took place in 2011 and was supervised by the University Mental Health Research Institute, linked to the University of Athens Medical School. The research project followed the well defined methodology and guidelines of the European School Survey Project on Alcohol and Other Drugs and was based on data collection, processing and analysis. The same study was repeated in 2015 but the results are not yet reported...
For data collection purposes, students of the sampled schools throughout Greece had to fill a questionnaire anonymously. The questions to be answered referred to smoking, drinking alcohol and usingeither legal or illegal drugs. They questioned the students’ perceptions in respect with the accessibility, availability and the potential risks of drug use.Also, they investigated other important issues of psychosocial health, certain demographic characteristics of the student population, deviant behavior, family relationships, relationships with peers, school environment, activities, leisure and other aspectsof the teenage life.
The 2011 survey involved a total of 614 schools and approximately 43000 active pupils almost equally split in Junior High School and High School classes. The questionnaire was finally completed by 37000 students. For our presentation we consider only the data related to students aged between 15 and 19 years old and we focus on the usage of drugs, leaving out the alcohol or smoking addiction.
In this survey the questions about the use of illegal drugs included awide range of substances,namelycannabis, ecstasy, cocaine, crack,amphetamines, LSD or other hallucinogenic, "magic mushrooms", GHB and heroin.
Analysis and Conclusions
About one student to seven (i.e. 15.2%), aged between 15 to 19 years old, has used somesort of illegalsubstance at least once in his or her life, while the majorityof them (9.8%) has repeated the use of the same substance for at least 3 times.This percentage drops to only 2.3% for younger students, aged between 13 to 14 years old and most of them report the use of illegal drugs for a couple of times throughout their lives.
Cannabis is the predominantillegal substance among all drugs. Specifically, the useof cannabis at least once is reported by the vast majority ofstudents 15 to 19 years (13.3%) who have taken drugs.Moreover, the recent cannabis use (i.e. at least once in the lastyear) is reported by 10.4% of those students and current useof cannabis (in the last month) is reported by 6.3% of them.
Drug usage in respect to genders
The boys report using illegal substances over twicethe rate compared to the girls aged between 15 and 19 years (20.9% and 9.3%respectively).Interestingly, those differences in respect to the two gendersbecome bigger with the frequency of use.
Drug usage in respect to age
There is a significant increase in the use of illegal substance as the students grow in the age span between 15 and 19 years old; this increase is mainly due to the repetition of use (equal to or greater than 3 times). The same conclusion applies to therecent (in the last year) and the current use (in thelast month) of cannabis, the predominant illegal drug.
Drug usage in respect to the degree of urbanization
In respect to the degree of urbanization of the Greek population, the survey defined and examined the use of drugs by young students in three geographical strata: Athens, the capital of Greece, together with the whole of Attica prefecture, Thessaloniki, the second largest city in Greece, together with the homonym prefecture and, finally,all other urban and suburban areas in Greece.
What came up as a conclusion is that, there is an increased use of illegal substances by students in Athens (19.2%) and Thessaloniki (19%) compared toall other regions (12%). Exactly the same applies as to the repeated use of drugs by students (more than three times throughout life), where the figure concerning Athens and Thessaloniki is almost double compared to all other regions in Greece collectively(12.7%, 12.2% versus 7.5%).
Drug usage in respect to the different types of substances
As mentioned above, cannabis is the illegal substanceused by the largest number of students who have madeillicit drug use.Usage of every other illegal substances reported by students is below5%. Regardless the types of illegal substance, the boys have higher rates of use than the girls.
The survey also examined the use of substances lawfully marketed aimingin changing the students’ mood like, inhalants (e.g.glues, benzene, ether, etc.) and prescribed but non medically used sedatives, hypnotics oranabolic steroids. Usage of inhalants is assigned the higher percentage (14.1%) followed by sedatives and hypnotics (9.3% and 2.8%respectively). On the other hand, the use of anabolic drugs or the mix of alcohol and drugs are rated below 5% by the student population. The gender differences concerning the use of these substancesare clearly smaller than for illicit drugs and, interestingly,the non-medicaluse of prescribed sedatives or hypnotics is indicated by roughly the samenumber of boys and girls.
Timelesstrends (1984-2011)
In a quarter of a century (years 1984-2011) there is almost a tripling in the usage of illegal substancesand this mostly refers to the repeated use of drugs rather than the limited use which may be viewed as a trial. During the particular time period there seems to be a considerable leapin 1998 followed by a recessionuntil about 2003 and then, still another progressive increase up to year 2011.Exactly the same trend characterizes the recent (in the last year) and current (in the last month) use of cannabis.
The increase in the use of any illegal substance at least oncein the last eight years (2003 - 2011) applies to both sexes but appears to be greater forboys as far as the repeated use is concerned. This timeless increase in the use of illegal substances is observed in all age groups (but especiallyin students who are 19 years old) and all three geographic layers as defined previously. All substances which correspond to the highest prevalence rates, contribute equally to the formulation of this timeless increase.
The changes over time and especially the leap observed in1998 seem to be closely related to the students' perceptionsin respect with the availability, accessibility and the potential hazards of the use of substances such ascannabis which is considered to be harmless.
Regional analysis - an alarming conclusion
Unfortunately, the study showed that the higher usage rates of illegal substances among the student population (aged 15 to 19 years old) were recorded in the Attica prefecture and the Eastern Macedonia and Thrace province. It is very likely that things have become worse in the recent years due to the harsh economic crisis and the devastation it brought in our society; we have to wait for the results of the most recent (2015) study. Our school is in Kavala, a picturesque, coastal town in Eastern Macedonia; this fact “rings us a bell” as to the measures need to be taken in order to reverse the situation and hopefully have the drug usage rate decreased!