Session: Risk and Protective Factors Predicting American Indian Adolescent Marijuana Use (Society for Prevention Research 25th Annual Meeting)

American Indian (AI) adolescents who reside on reservations report the highest levels of marijuana use among ethnic/racial groups in the U.S. Compared to findings from Monitoring the Future (MTF), AI 8^th graders living on or near reservations were about 4 times as likely to have used marijuana in the past month as compared to their MTF counterparts, and 8% of the AI 8^th graders and 14% of the 10^th graders reported daily or near daily use compared to 1.3% and 3.6% of MTF 8^th and 10^th graders, respectively. NIDA Director Nora Volkow (2014) called these latter statistics “highly worrisome”. Yet, little research has examined the factors that predict these high rates of use. This session presents three studies that examine relationships between AI marijuana use and three separate domains of risk and protective factors – family, personality, and norms. In particular, these studies use data from an ongoing surveillance of substance use epidemiology and etiology among youth who attend schools that are on or near AI reservations. Data were obtained during 2009-2014 by surveying 7^th – 12^th graders attending 35 middle schools and 17 high schools located in 5 regions – Northwest (NW), Northern Plains (NP), Upper Great Lakes, Southeast, Southwest (SW). Paper #1 examines relationships between distal and proximal family factors and lifetime and current marijuana use among AI and white middle and high school students. Strong effects were found for family structure, parental monitoring, family conflict, and family sanctions against marijuana use for both AI and white students. Weaker effects were found for family participation in school events, and no relationship was found for family communication about marijuana. Paper #2 examines the relationships between two personality factors, self-esteem and risk seeking, on lifetime and last year marijuana use and level of marijuana user. Results indicate differential relationships between these personality factors, including their interaction, and the measures of use. For example, lifetime use was negatively predicted by self-esteem and the interaction of risk seeking and self-esteem while risk seeking positively predicted having ever used marijuana alone. Paper #3 examines relationships between social norms, perceived harm and marijuana use and consequences of use. The results suggest that descriptive norms have a more direct effect on marijuana use and its related consequences compared to injunctive norms, and that injunctive norms influence marijuana related consequences via perceived harm. For all papers, implications for prevention strategies are discussed, as well as recommendations for future research.