Abstract

HERNANDEZ LOPEZ, Teresa et al. The starting Age of Drugs Consumption as an Indicator for Problematic Consumption. Psychosocial Intervention [online]. 2009, vol.18, n.3, pp.199-212. ISSN 2173-4712.

Our research's aim consists on studying the relationship between early beginning of tobacco, alcohol and drugs taking, and problematic consumption, in a sample of 6280 young people from Madrid in a range of 15-24 years old. The early experimentation with tobacco, alcohol (before 14 years old) or cannabis (before 15 years old) is related to a higher prevalence of daily tobacco and cannabis consumption, to a daily alcohol-abusive patterns and to either regular multiple-drugs consumption or concurrent consumption of 2 or more drugs in the last month. It has been found too an association with negative consequences caused by alcohol and drugs consumption in economic, academic, and family life. This research reveals that the strength of these kinds of associations increases with the number of consumed substances very early. In fact, that happens in almost all the analyzed associations, and this is the reason of our suggestion of including an analysis of precocious starting of gathered consumptions in future researches.

Keywords : early beginning; tobacco; alcohol; drugs; problematic consumption; adolescent.

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