Health and Developmental Consequences of Youth Drug Abuse

Research Findings from February, 1999 Director's Report

This section lists selected summaries from NIDA funded research projects that investigate the developmental implications of drug use. The summaries provided were selected from recent issues of the Director's Report to the National Advisory Council on Drug Abuse. For a more comprehensive listing of NIDA funded projects see the Director's Report.

Stress and Adolescent Development

In a recent paper, Dr. Carol Kellogg and her associates report that restraint, as a form of stress, induced Fos in a broader spectrum of neurons in young adult than in juvenile male rats. The Fos protein, a product of an immediate early gene, is transiently expressed in neurons after stimulation. The lack of Fos-positive cells in specific areas of juveniles may relate to maturation of specific brain nuclei as age-related differences were observed in Fos production. These findings provide insight into the temporal regulation of the nuclei activated by the stressors as well as into the adolescent development of brain regions involved in mediating various stress responses. Kellogg, C.K., Awatramani, G.B., Piekut, D.T. Neuroscience, 83(3), pp. 681-689, 1998.

Disruptive, Delinquent and Aggressive Behavior in Female Adolescents with a Psychoactive Substance Use Disorder: Relation to Executive Cognitive Functioning

Researchers at CEDAR reported a study with four objectives: (1) to determine whether female adolescents with a psychoactive substance use disorder are more impaired than controls on a battery of neuropsychological tests of Executive Cognitive Functioning (ECF); (2) to determine whether these individuals exhibit higher levels of disruptive, delinquent and aggressive behavior compared with controls; (3) to determine whether ECF is related to disruptive, delinquent and aggressive behavior in this population; and (4) to determine whether these relations are moderated by drug use. Multiple indicators of ECF, and disruptive, delinquent and aggressive behavior, as well as drug use, were used to test these relations in 188 female adolescents who qualified for a Mental Disorders-III-Revised (DSM-III-R) diagnosis of a psychoactive substance use disorder and 95 normal controls (aged 14-18 yrs). ECF was related to disruptive, delinquent and aggressive behavior even when chronological age, SES and drug use were accounted for. The final regression models suggested that drug use was more strongly related to disruptive and delinquent behavior, whereas ECF was more strongly related to aggression. Giancola, P.R., Mezzich, A.C., Tarter, R.E. Disruptive, Delinquent and Aggressive Behavior in Female Adolescents with a Psychoactive Substance Use Disorder: Relation to Executive Cognitive Functioning. Journal of Studies on Alcohol. Vol. 59(5), pp. 560-567, 1998.