The report presents a profile of why young people in the study are considered resilient to drug use and young people’s reasons for not using drugs. It explores experiences of and strategies for refusing drugs.

Through the use of case studies, the research examines the complexities involved in being resilient and how different factors come into play at different stages and in different contexts for young people.

It uses theories developed in the field of cognitive and social psychology to discuss the factors that facilitate or impede resilience.

The government’s Drugs Strategy has the overarching aim of ‘reducing the harm that drugs cause to society, including communities, individuals and their families’, and there are four key Drugs Strategy targets including young people.

Under the young people’s target the government has set the objective to “have reduced the use of Class A drugs and the frequent use of any illicit drugs by all young people [under the age of 25] and, in particular, by the most vulnerable groups by 2008”.

Within this context the research supports Home Office Aim 5, which seeks to reduce drug use among young people, in particular the most vulnerable groups.

Stage one of the research used the 2003 Offending, Crime and Justice Survey (OCJS) data to explore the factors associated with taking drugs.

Rather than looking at the factors associated with using drugs, the second stage of the research looked at ‘resilient’ young people to learn from their experiences.

It did this by using a sampling frame of young people considered resilient. Stage two was a qualitative study of young people’s resilience to drug use.

Research outcomes indicate that behavioural and attitudinal variables have a great deal to contribute to understanding risk factors for taking drugs. Three aspects to being resilient were identified, young people themselves identified thirteen reasons for not taking drugs and three types of refusal strategies were reported.

The report concludes that the factors young people have identified as facilitating them to remain resilient may be useful in the development of a tool for social workers, schools and other agencies that work with young people to assess a young person’s vulnerability to using drugs, and has potential implications for policy.

Home Office
Phone: +44 20 7035 4848
public.enquiries@homeoffice.gsi.gov.uk

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01/01/2007

The National Centre for Social Research; Home Office; British Market Research Bureau

research

Urban Policy > Security & crime prevention > Anti-crime policy

Drug crime