Risk Factors for Adolescent Marijuana Use

Abstract

Marijuana use has been linked to a wide variety of negative consequences, especially for those who initiate use in early adolescence and become daily or regular users as a teenager. If these negative consequences are to be avoided, prevention efforts must focus upstream on childhood and adolescent developmental periods before marijuana use is initiated or has become frequent. Upstream prevention targets factors that predict initiation and escalation of marijuana use, which are often called risk and protective factors. This chapter provides a review of current knowledge about risk and protective factors, with an emphasis on psychosocial variables specific to marijuana, differentiating predictors of marijuana use from predictors of other legal and illegal drugs when possible. The chapter also provides suggestions for future research in light of the rapidly changing legal and community conditions related to access, availability, and norms of marijuana use.