Previous research, over a decade old, suggests students attending alternative high schools (AHS) engage in high levels of health-risk behaviors. Data from the 2007 Minnesota Student Survey for students attending AHS ("n" = 2,847) and traditional high schools (THS; "n" = 87,468) were used for this cross-sectional analysis to…

This occasional paper presents national demographic subgroup data for the 1975-2016 Monitoring the Future (MTF) national survey results on 8th , 10th, and 12th graders' use of drugs, alcohol, and tobacco. MTF is funded by the National Institute on Drug Abuse at the National Institutes of Health under a series of investigator-initiated, competitive…

This report documents differences in the earnings and employment patterns of U.S. adults with different levels of education. It also compares health-related behaviors, reliance on public assistance programs, civic participation, and indicators of the well-being of the next generation. In addition to reporting median earnings by education level,…

Problem: Priority health-risk behaviors contribute to the leading causes of morbidity and mortality among youth and adults. Population-based data on these behaviors at the national, state, and local levels can help monitor the effectiveness of public health interventions designed to protect and promote the health of youth nationwide. Reporting…

This collection of fact sheets includes: (1) Alcohol and Drug Use among Middle School Students in West Virginia; (2) Bullying and Suicidal among Middle School Students in West Virginia; (3) Chronic Disease and Disease Prevention among Middle School Students in West Virginia; (4) Dietary Behaviors among Middle School Students in West Virginia; (5)…

The "Annual Disability Statistics Compendium" is a publication of statistics about people with disabilities and about the government programs which serve them. It is modeled after the "Statistical Abstracts of the United States," published yearly by the U.S. Department of Commerce. The "Compendium" is designed to…

A typical structural equation model is intended to reproduce the means, variances, and correlations or covariances among a set of variables based on parameter estimates of a highly restricted model. It is not widely appreciated that the sample statistics being modeled can be quite sensitive to outliers and influential observations, leading to bias…

Communities across the country have a vested interest in making sure that young people develop into healthy productive citizens and avoid behaviors that can jeopardize their own health and well-being and threaten the well-being of their families and neighborhoods as well. Substance abuse and delinquency are prime examples of behaviors that get in…

Objective: To determine if post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) is associated with health risk behaviors among Operations Enduring and Iraqi Freedom (OEF/OIF) veterans attending college. Method: Using 2008 Boynton College Student Health Survey data, we tested associations between self-reported PTSD diagnosis and self-reported risk behaviors…

Objective: To compare patterns of water pipe and cigarette smoking in an eastern Mediterranean country. Methods: In 2008, 1781 out of 1877 seventh graders enrolled in 19 randomly selected schools in Irbid, Jordan, were surveyed. Results: Experimentation with and current water pipe smoking were more prevalent than cigarette smoking (boys: 38.7% vs…

Continuing medical education's transition from an emphasis on dissemination to changing clinical practice has made it increasingly necessary for CME providers to develop effective interorganizational collaborations. Although interorganizational collaboration has become commonplace in most sectors of government, business, and academia, our review…

The hookah pipe is an ancient tool for smoking tobacco and is a growing public health concern at the global level. YouTube is a website that allows its members to post videos for people to watch and to share comments about the videos in an online forum. The purpose of the study was to investigate the types of videos about hookah on YouTube, their…

Fatherhood can be a turning point in development and in men's crime and substance use trajectories. At-risk boys (N = 206) were assessed annually from ages 12 to 31 years. Crime, arrest, and tobacco, alcohol, and marijuana use trajectories were examined. Marriage was associated with lower levels of crime and less frequent substance use. Following…

Having friends who engage in disruptive behavior in childhood may be a risk factor for childhood tobacco experimentation. This study tested the role of friends' disruptive behavior as a mediator of the effects of a classroom based intervention on children's tobacco experimentation. 433 Children (52% males) were randomly assigned to the Good…

Objective: Risk-taking behavior (eg, alcohol abuse, tobacco usage, misuse of prescription medications) among college students is a widespread problem. This study focused not only on the frequency of risky health behaviors in college students, but also the companions with whom they engaged in such behaviors. Methods: Three hundred and twelve…