This application seeks support to conduct secondary analyses of data generated by an ongoing longitudinal survey of American Indian students (grades 9-12) attending a tribally administered boarding school in Tahlequah, Oklahoma. The survey is intended to establish the prevalence and incidence of symptoms of substance use/abuse, depression, and anxiety within this setting, as well as to shed light on the relative contribution of specific phenomena--notably, stressful life events, coping strategies, social support, personal control, and self-esteem--to these outcomes and to school-related problems such as disciplinary incidents and dropout. The proposed analyses have the following specific aims: 1) to assess the internal consistency and reliability of self-report measures for symptoms of substance use/abuse, depression (CES-D), and anxiety; 2) to compare the dimensions of substance use/abuse, depression, and anxiety identified for the study sample with those appearing in the literature for other relevant populations, Indian and non-Indian; 3) to examine variation by age, sex, and time in these self-report measures of substance use/abuse, depression, and anxiety as well as factors associated with such variation, and 4) to explore the usefulness of several different theoretical models for understanding the interaction among stressful life events, coping strategies, social support, personal control, and self-esteem as they contribute to substance use/abuse, depression, anxiety, school-related disciplinary incidents, and dropout. Few studies of Indian youth speak to the relationship among substance use/abuse and symptoms of depression as well as anxiety; almost none evaluate the interaction of stress, coping, and social support in this context. Disciplinary incidents and school dropout among American Indian youth have long been of interest, but seldom subject to systematic study, especially in regard to factors like substance use/abuse. Thus, the proposed analyses will add considerably to our current knowledge about the measures in question, about the substantive experiences tapped by them, and about their interaction.

R01DA006076

1990-09-30

1994-08-31