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Decline in teen drug use continues, surprising experts

arstechnica.com

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Re: Decline in teen drug use continues, surprising experts

#291
post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Does compulsive technology use trigger the same neural pathways as addictive substances? Because "addiction" is a very loaded term (with a specific clinical definition when it's not being used colloquially), and the sources you cited used "attachment" instead.

I think the answer here is a bit subtle and hard to explain, because it contradicts a lot of common assumptions about addiction and drugs. In short, many addictive substances create a chemical dependence that often has awful, even potentially fatal chemical withdrawal symptoms. Behavioral addictions don't cause this, which makes people assume they are entirely something different, and categorically less serious and d…

I'm not really sure how the behavioural addiction here is harming the person. You're talking about an external harm with the behavioural addiction being symptom treatment due to feeling trapped.

Re: Decline in teen drug use continues, surprising experts

#292

I wonder if the new drug of choice is actually technology. In some ways I think that the addiction to technology has some similar mellowing effects as drugs. Some research indicates that smartphone addiction is also related to low self-esteem and avoidant attachment [1] and that smartphones can become an object of attachment [2]. The replacement of drugs by technology is not surprising as it significantly strengthens…

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Re: Decline in teen drug use continues, surprising experts

#293

A question for older folks: what did drugs do for us? Why did we do them? For me, drugs were: - socialization. I met a lot of friends through alcohol & drugs and they became the social glue for my circle. Alcohol & drugs became a large part of my identity. - a way to cope with boredom. Every day is a party when you're high. - identity. In my generation, drugs were mostly cool and associated with iconoclasts, artists,…

Yeah but at some point the life of the party became boring because it was all day every day. So we just hung out and smoked weed and played SNES, PSX on a daily basis and went to clubs on weekends and cafés from wed/thur onwards.

I met so many people only through smoking weed. And because weed is such a laid back drug, we were all laid back and friendly with each other.

What I learned to hate over the years was that daily routine of finding something to smoke. We had our dealers we phoned up or sometimes we would deal ourselves to finance our consumption.

Dealing drugs was another level though. Hostilities arose. Some people claimed turf and threatened others with violence, those were "miraculously" found by the police and landed in jail. Also dealers that scammed others. The scene had a way to police themselves. Those were the good years.

Later the quality became worse and the quantity as well. It was no longer... how should I put it,... fun and games but people discovered it as a source of making profit. Even friends or people you considered friends would try to scam you and you weren't any different. That time began approximately when the Afghanistan wars began and the CIA was cut off from the cannabis sources.

It was like this, we would smoke weed in the summer and black afghan in winter. The black afghan fell off. What remained was green hash from the turks and weed, which was stretched with hairspray and silica sand.

I quit doing ganja, also because I hated being stoned all day every day and having to do the daily finding weed routine. I was so tired of it, also "what am I doing with my life".

I lost most "friends", I had to, to not be exposed to this crap on a daily basis. I wanted to get somewhere in life not just consume weed all day and be a loser who got nothing done. Better late than never.

I very rarely do resin nowadays, not by smoking but orally, and it's like once a year or every 2 years. Cannabis is definitely good for your health, if not overdone.

Re: Decline in teen drug use continues, surprising experts

#294
post #277

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why would anyone put fent in cocaine? It’s more expensive and has the opposite effect. Drug selling is all about repeat customers I don’t really believe this happens apart from accidents.

TL;DR: If fentanyl could be evenly dispersed in cocaine at a tiny percentage of the weight, there’s a theoretical reason for a dealer to add it. However, it’s likely rare and more often accidental. I agree with kstrauser—most cases of fentanyl in cocaine are likely due to contamination from preparing multiple drugs in the same space. Accidental fentanyl poisonings usually involve people using other downers, like hero…

Interesting how I could instantly tell that this was written by AI. CharGPT has a very distinguishable style and reasoning.

Re: Decline in teen drug use continues, surprising experts

#295
post #167

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not to sound snarky, but please consider interpreting comments like these as making a statement about rate rather than an absolute binary.

Right back at you. I was also commenting on rate rather than saying that I saw one or 2 in the last 10-15 years. Not all locations are the same though, so maybe there has been a noticeable decrease where you're at. Personally, I think I've felt an increase if anything.

These changes aren't always easy to spot. I live in a city that acquired a significant Ukrainian population over the last two years. Whenever I see a group of kids that biked to an arbitrary location and play, they turn out to be young Ukrainians. They do the exact thing local kids would do 20 years ago.

Re: Decline in teen drug use continues, surprising experts

#297

A question for older folks: what did drugs do for us? Why did we do them? For me, drugs were: - socialization. I met a lot of friends through alcohol & drugs and they became the social glue for my circle. Alcohol & drugs became a large part of my identity. - a way to cope with boredom. Every day is a party when you're high. - identity. In my generation, drugs were mostly cool and associated with iconoclasts, artists,…

The improved treatment, and acceptance, of ADHD is certainly one key element here. I hope we continue to support kids if they show symptoms of any psychological disorder.

Here's a 2018 study following kids into adulthood and questioning them on their substance abuse: https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC5985671/

My brother is one of those really bad cases, while I got my diagnosis just recently; never had more than a slight drinking problem which has almost disappeared since the I started taking medication.

Re: Decline in teen drug use continues, surprising experts

#298

Hum, If we hypothesize that drugs abuse could be ruled in part by genetics (some people are more prone to became addict than other), then the drug epidemics from 70's, 80's and 90's should had pruned a lot of this genes from the population. The current teen not doing drugs are mostly the sons of the former teen not being killed by drugs on its 20's (because they didn't do drugs, or were able to quit drugs before it w…

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Re: Decline in teen drug use continues, surprising experts

#299
post #277

Earlier quoted context omitted.

TL;DR: If fentanyl could be evenly dispersed in cocaine at a tiny percentage of the weight, there’s a theoretical reason for a dealer to add it. However, it’s likely rare and more often accidental. I agree with kstrauser—most cases of fentanyl in cocaine are likely due to contamination from preparing multiple drugs in the same space. Accidental fentanyl poisonings usually involve people using other downers, like hero…

Interesting how I could instantly tell that this was written by AI. CharGPT has a very distinguishable style and reasoning.

That's why I included a pastebin link of my original reply that I asked it to summarise - I hate when people comment "here's what ChatGPT thinks on this subject", but hoped people wouldn't mind a lazily-shortened version of my own writing!

Re: Decline in teen drug use continues, surprising experts

#300

There is also a corresponding decline in alcohol consumption. One angle that hasn't been researched enough is the link to anti-anxiety and anti-depression medication. These has been a significant rise in the prescription of both to young adults: https://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/anxiety-prescripti... And on these medications there are often severe interactions with alcohol and drugs which would be enough to f…

The other thing I haven't seen in this thread yet is that kids today are really focused on is: lifestyle -- they want to work hard at school so they can get great jobs to make a lot of money so they can afford to own a home and live healthy lives. With the cost of living, and everything else, they're going to have to make a lot of money to life the kind of life that they're used to as kids. My kids are not on social…

It's great but the way you write I can't stop comparing them to what used to be brainwashed communist kids.

People aren't robots, or we would be living in a sad world

What did you do to make them behave like that ? That's uncommon, at least in occidental society. Closer to what the CCP does.

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