Introduction
Drug abuse is a common phenomenon among the youth, especially among unemployed young people. It usually involves young people abusing various drugs that turn out to be harmful not only to the health of the individual but also to the entire society in different ways. The vice is common in society and there is a need to involve families in its eradication since lack of family involvement contributes to its increase. Families sometimes lack skills to help young people prevent use and addiction to drugs. This paper aims at examining the development of family ties to prevent drug abuse among young people.
Literature Review
Substance abuse by youths is a persistent public health problem worldwide, and alcohol is the most commonly used substance among adolescents. According to Buddy (2011), substance abuse mostly known as drug abuse is the maladaptive sequence of drug or substance usage that is not seen as dependent. Examples of these substances include alcohol, cocaine, opioids, marijuana, heroin, and methaqualones. Substance abuse leads to momentous problems such as the inability to sufficiently take care of personal responsibility or even cover up the role at school, work or home. Some issues may include the frequent application of substances in situations where it might be harmful to do so such as driving while under the influence of alcohol. Repeated legal problems result from substance use including public intoxication or disorderly conduct, and the continued use of substances even though the substance use is causing considerable problems in a persons life.
There are some substance abuses that can be abused for the effects of altering the mood although they are not drugs at all. However, there are some substances that can be abused but have no effect of mood alteration or intoxication inclusive of anabolic steroids (McCrady, 1996). In most cases, a considerable number of people refer to substance abuse as the use of illegal drugs. A significant number of professional researchers in the field of preventing substance abuse argue that any use of illegal drugs is by definition abuse. This is because such drugs are potentially addictive or result in severe negative health influences, thus any use of illegal substances is dangerous and abusive. Other professionals argue that informal, recreational use of some drugs is not dangerous and is purely use, not abuse. For instance, the article shows that the most vocal of the proponents of recreational drug use are those who use marijuana. They argue that marijuana is not addictive and has a significant number of beneficial qualities, unlike hard drugs.
A good number of surveys have been done in order to demonstrate how various aspects affect the possibilities of a young person to begin abusing substances. An article by Christoffersen & Soothill (2003) indicates that parental and family factors serve the innermost position in long-term pathways leading to abuse of substance, although peer pressure plays as a causative component near to the time when youth instigate substance use. This implies that even though most people view pressure as the core factor that makes most youths start abusing substances, it is vital to note that a positive family surrounding is the foremost reason may not participate in these actions inclusive of substance abuse and other behaviors youths enjoy engaging in such as delinquency and unprotected sex.
Despite the fact that peer pressure is quite influential, young people’s selection of peers is highly influenced by the relationship the child has with the parents. For instance, when youths have a positive relationship with their parents, they are most likely to select friends who have a positive influence on their lives. Families can help prevent substance abuse among youth populations by ensuring secure and healthy parent-child closeness, sufficient parental supervision, monitoring and effective discipline (Hussong & Chassin, 1997). In addition, they can also ensure daily involvement in the life of the child, promote communication of pro-social family values, as well as become supportive in all aspects of the child’s life such as emotionally, cognitively, financially and socially.
The family both as a source of problems or as an insufficient socializer in surviving skills to handle issues has been highly disregarded as an essential element of effective prevention programs. However, a developing body of literature exists to demonstrate that the family is among the crucial variables in the prevention or the prediction of substance abuse among the youth population. In most cases, when family factors are strongly implicated in the etiology of adolescent substance abuse. Therefore, the prevention strategies to deal with these family factors are all school-based school programs that have tried to equip children with important social skills. These family programs are advantageous because they help youths avoid substance abuse both through resisting peer pressure and using efficient social skills to solve problems (Hartman, 1998). Therefore, families are supposed to promote these social and skills to help prevent substance abuse among the youth population.
Conclusion
In conclusion, is a persistent public health problem worldwide, and alcohol is the most commonly used substance among adolescents. According to Buddy (2011), substance abuse mostly known as drug abuse is the maladaptive sequence of drug or substance usage that is not seen as dependent. Examples of these substances include alcohol, cocaine, opioids, marijuana, heroin, and methaqualones. The usage of these substances may lead to criminal punishment in addition to possible physical, social, and psychological harm, both strongly relying on local authority just as discussed above (O’Farrell, 1995). Therefore, in most cases, families can help prevent substance abuse in the youth population by ensuring secure and healthy parent-child closeness, sufficient parental supervision, monitoring and effective discipline.
In addition, they can also ensure daily involvement in the life of the child, promote communication of pro-social family values, as well as become supportive in all aspects of the child’s life such as emotionally, cognitively, financially and socially. This is because families are seen as the most crucial factor in helping prevent substance abuse among the youth population (O’Farrell & Birchler, 1997). Thus, in order to achieve and solve the issues of substance abuse among youths using family relationship skills, it is necessary that the right training programs are implemented. This is because, through the right and well-planned family skills training programs, parents will get to know and understand the best ways in which they can implement in order to solve the problem of substance abuse among the youth population.
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