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Biomedical subjects

R Dembo

Publications and source records attributed to R Dembo.

At least 37 records · Page 2Linked to original sources
PubMed1991

Recidivism among high risk youths: a 2 1/2-year follow-up of a cohort of juvenile detainees.

We report some results from a longitudinal study of juvenile detainees. Analyses were directed toward determining whether the youths' alcohol or other drug use and their emotional/psychological problems at entry into the detention center predicted subsequent arrests for new offenses during the 24 and 30 months following their initial interviews. Statistically significant relationships were found between the youths' demographic characteristics (age, race, gender), referral history, reason for placement in the detention center, cocaine use (as measured by urinalysis), and recidivism. The magnitude of these relationships increased with the length of the follow-up period.

Adolescent↗
PubMed1990

Examination of the relationships among drug use, emotional/psychological problems, and crime among youths entering a juvenile detention center.

Urine testing and confidential interviews of youths entering a juvenile detention center in a southeastern city produced some striking results in regard to their drug use, delinquent behavior, and emotional/psychological problems. Recent users of marijuana/hashish and cocaine had higher rates of referral to juvenile court for property and drug offenses than nonusers. The results suggest that interviewing and urine testing of youthful detainees for drug use at the point of entry into secure detention is a promising method for screening youngsters with histories of delinquent behavior. Implications of these findings are drawn.

Adolescent↗
PubMed1990

A longitudinal study of the relationships among alcohol use, marijuana/hashish use, cocaine use, and emotional/psychological functioning problems in a cohort of high-risk youths.

There is increasing recognition that children involved in the justice system often have serious, multiple problems in the areas of physical abuse, sexual exploitation, and alcohol/other drug use (ADM). Using data collected in a longitudinal study of detained juveniles, we test a model of the relationships of these problems. Significant over-time interrelationships are found among these problems. Research and policy implications of these important findings are drawn.

Adolescent↗
PubMed1989

Physical abuse, sexual victimization, and illicit drug use: replication of a structural analysis among a new sample of high-risk youths.

Mounting evidence of serious adverse consequences of childhood physical and sexual abuse has important implications for public health officials and care providers. Given the potential impact on social policy of this area of inquiry, programmatic research is needed for the validation of theoretical models across populations and over time. This study, based on a sample of high-risk youths, replicates a structural model that specified the influence of child physical and sexual abuse on self-derogation and drug use. Results suggest that for male and female youths, physical abuse and sexual victimization had a direct effect on self-derogation and illicit drug use, and an indirect effect on drug use that was mediated by self-derogation. Moreover, structural coefficients for the model were found to be identical across gender. Subsequent analyses demonstrated the equivalence of the structural model of child physical and sexual abuse on drug use across two study cohorts. Implications for the identification and treatment of youths in high-risk groups are discussed.

Adolescent↗
PubMed1988

The relationship between physical and sexual abuse and tobacco, alcohol, and illicit drug use among youths in a juvenile detention center.

The relationships between child physical and sexual abuse and tobacco, alcohol, and illicit drug use are little understood and underinvestigated. Data gathered from a study of youths in a regional detention center permitted an examination of this issue. The results indicate that the youths' physical and sexual abuse experiences are significantly and positively related to their use of illicit drugs. The implications of these findings for further research are drawn.

Adolescent↗
PubMed1988

The relationship between physical and sexual abuse and illicit drug use: a replication among a new sample of youths entering a juvenile detention center.

The relationship between child physical and sexual abuse and illicit drug use are little understood and underinvestigated. Our previous study of this association found that a sample of detained youths' physical and sexual abuse experiences were related significantly and positively to their use of illicit drugs. Data gathered from a new sample of detained juveniles, interviewed 3 years after our first study, relating to this issue were examined and our previous findings were replicated.

Adolescent↗
PubMed1987

Physical abuse, sexual victimization and illicit drug use: a structural analysis among high risk adolescents.

The relationships between child physical and sexual abuse and illicit drug use are relatively unexplored and obscure. Data gathered from a sample of youths in a juvenile detention center permitted an examination of this important issue. A structural model, specifying the influence of child physical and sexual abuse variables on the youths' illicit drug use, directly and as mediated by self-derogation, was estimated among male and female detainees. Results suggest that for both gender groups, sexual victimization had a primarily direct effect on drug use, whereas physical abuse had both a direct and an indirect effect on drug use. The indirect effect of physical abuse on drug use was mediated by self-derogation. Further analysis indicated race did not affect the results. The implications of these results for theory and research on the etiology of drug use and the identification of youths in high risk groups who are likely to become seriously involved in drug use are discussed.

Adolescent↗
PubMed1985

A causal analysis of early drug involvement in three inner-city neighborhood settings.

Building upon previous studies stressing the importance of contextual effects in psychosocial behavior, we test a model of drug involvement among inner-city youths living in neighborhoods varying in the perceived degree of toughness/drug use. The drug involvement of the youths is hypothesized to result from the availability of drugs, image of drug-using/gang-involved persons, friends' drug use, and participation in street culture activities. In each of the toughness/drug use settings, image of drug-using/gang-involved persons related positively to friends' use of alcohol and marijuana, friends' use of alcohol and marijuana related positively to participation in street culture spare-time activities and drug involvement, and participation in street culture pursuits related positively to drug involvement. Neighborhood-setting-specific relationships are also observed. The complexity of the model, as reflected in the number of path coefficients, and the ability of the variables in the model to predict the youths' drug involvement increase as we proceed from low toughness/drug use (R2 = .28) to medium toughness/drug use (R2 = .30) to high toughness/drug use (R2 = .38) neighborhoods. The importance of examining youths' environmental experiences in understanding their drug involvement, especially their relationship to neighborhood drug use subcultures, is emphasized.

Adolescent↗
PubMed1985

Environmental setting and early drug involvement among inner-city junior high school youths.

This study explores the drug use of a sample of inner-city junior high school youths by examining a hypothesized, interactive relationship between perceived toughness/drug use in their neighborhood and the youths' demographic, neighborhood orientation/involvement, and drug use context factors in regard to their involvement with drugs. The results dramatically showed that the youths' views of their environmental setting operate as a conditioning factor in understanding the correlates of their drug involvement. In supporting the hypothesis, prosocial correlates of drug use are stressed in settings characterized by high toughness/drug use settings. Our findings urge that serious consideration be given to examining social contextual effects on drug taking as a means to understanding this behavior among different sociocultural groups.

Adolescent↗
PubMed1984

The effect of perceived neighborhood setting on self-reported tobacco, alcohol, and marijuana use among inner-city minority junior high school youth.

The relationship between neighborhood setting and drug use appears to be drug specific. For alcohol and tobacco a knowledge of peer (friends') use was highly predictive of personal use, independent of how tough or drug involved the neighborhood was thought to be, but quite dependent on neighborhood perceptions for personal marijuana use, becoming more predictive as the neighborhood was perceived as tougher and more drug involved. Knowledge of spare-time activities was predictive of tobacco and marijuana use (independent of neighborhood) but not predictive for alcohol use. The data suggest that because the relationships are complex, intervention/prevention strategies must not only be drug specific but must proceed on many fronts simultaneously. Some suggestions are offered, along with a discussion of findings which may help identify non-users and users in the same population.

Adolescent↗
PubMed1983

A model for assessing and improving drug abuse treatment resource use in inner-city areas.

While the field of drug use research has grown increasingly sophisticated theoretically and methodologically, there continues to be a need to improve our understanding of how drug abuse treatment programs relate to the communities they serve. In addressing this need, the present paper develops a research model, incorporating systems theory concepts, which provides a framework for evaluating how the relationships of drug abuse treatment programs to various consumer and community interest groups affect their performance.

Adult↗
PubMed1982

Typification and processing in a screening unit for drug abusers.

This paper reports the results of a study into the diagnosis and assignment to treatment of drug abusers that took place in a screening unit of a large drug treatment facility. Based on observation and interviews among clients and screening staff, the research found that the rational assignment of drug abusers to care was made problematic by the features of daily life with which staff had to deal. In particular, custodial goals, such as the need to manage clients, had considerable influence in staff assessments of what "treatment" drug abusers should receive and where they should be sent for care. Conclusions are drawn with regard to improving the capability of these units to better address client, rather than staff and facility organizational, needs.

Adult↗
PubMed1981

Survival orientation and the drug use experiences of a sample of inner city junior high school youths.

This paper focuses on the association between a sample of inner city junior high school youths' survival orientation and their (1) environmental relationships and (2) drug use context and substance use experiences. A survival orientation index was developed based on the youths' feelings about the need to join a gang, the chances of making a "success" in life, the difficulty of getting oneself together growing up in their neighborhoods, and how hard it was to avoid getting into trouble in their neighborhoods. The findings indicate that the more the youths' feel neighborhood pressures to survive the: (1) more esteemed people who use drugs and are involved with gangs are perceived to be; (2) more often they claim to engage in street culture, gang-related spare time activities; (3) less frequently they use print media and engage in stay at home activities; (4) more frequently they indicate their friends use "hard" drugs; (5) more often they claim to being drunk or very, very high on alcohol; and (6) more often they claim to having trouble with family or friends as a result of alcohol or other drug use. In highlighting the influence of social stresses in the youth's neighborhoods on their drug-taking experiences, the findings point to the importance of developing socioculturally informed prevention thrusts to reduce the youths' drug abuse risk and to teach them how to counteract negative neighborhood pressures.

Adolescent↗
PubMed1981

Critical issues and experiences in drug treatment and prevention evaluation.

The present paper considers major perspectives on behavior that are prevalent in the social sciences and shows how these relate to divergent conceptions of the people who use various substances and the ways in which drug taking is associated with individuals' personal, social, and cultural experiences. This discussion will enable us to develop an ethnographically informed, social context model of drug use which sees substance use as motivated, adaptive behavior that is pursued in the consummation of valued experiences. Discussion next turns to reviewing relevant drug treatment and drug education/prevention literature, as well as the experiences of the author, that have informed the development of the frame of reference the paper emphasizes. In this process a coherent way of approaching the relationships individuals may establish with drugs and strategies for drug treatment and education/prevention efforts are set out.

Goals↗
PubMed1980

Life-style and drug involvement among youths in an inner city junior high school.

Data gathered in a winter 1976 survey of youths attending a New York City junior high school were analyzed to learn how features of their life-styles related to their involvement with drugs. The results indicate that the youths' substance use is an environmentally related phenomenon. The factors of peer-held esteem of drug using, gang involved persons, friends' use of alcohol and marijuana, and participation in spare-time activities of a drug/street culture nature were found to provide important insights into the youths' drug taking.

Adolescent↗