Close Relationships with Parents Promote Healthier Brain Development in High-Risk Teens, Buffering Against Alcohol Use Disorder

For teens at elevated risk of developing alcohol use disorder (AUD), close relationships with parents can help mitigate their genetic and environmental vulnerability, a new study suggests. The offspring of people with AUD are four times more likely than others to develop the disorder. Increasing evidence suggests that this heritable risk may be either amplified or mitigated by the quality of parenting.

The AVID college prep program leads to lower substance use, better health behaviors among high school students, UCLA-led research suggests

New UCLA-led research finds that a college preparatory program for youth experiencing educational inequities that operates in about 13% of U.S public high schools has a positive effect on students’ social networks, psycho-social outcomes, and health behaviors.  The findings, published Dec. 16 in the peer-reviewed journal Pediatrics, suggests that the Advancement via Individual Determination (AVID) program, aimed at increasing educational opportunities for under-represented and economically disadvantaged students, also significantly reduces substance use.

State-level Earned Income Tax Credit linked to reduction in high-risk HIV behavior among single mothers

UCLA research finds that a refundable State-level Earned Income Tax Credit (SEITC) of 10% or above the Federal EITC was associated with a 21% relative risk reduction in reported behavior that could put single mothers at high risk for becoming infected with HIV during the previous year. Also, a 10 percentage-point increase in SEITC was linked to a 38% relative reduction in the same reported high-risk behavior the previous year.

Concussions are associated with cognitive, behavioral, and emotional health consequences for student athletes

Concussions can have a compounding effect on children, leading to long-term cognitive, behavioral, and emotional health consequences, according to researchers at The University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston (UTHealth), who published their findings in the American Journal of Sports Medicine.

Students Who Up Their Cannabis Use Face Increased Risk of Alcohol Problems

Cannabis use can worsen some consequences of alcohol use among young adult drinkers over time, according to a new study which tracked the frequency of cannabis use and negative drinking outcomes among college students over three years. More than one in five young drinkers use cannabis, often (but not always) at the same time as drinking alcohol. This is a concern because the effects of cannabis might combine with those of alcohol to increase negative outcomes of drinking, such as impaired driving or developing an alcohol use disorder Although previous research has suggested a link between cannabis use and alcohol consequences, there have been few long-term evaluations of the impact of fluctuations in cannabis use on alcohol consequences over time. The latest study, published in the journal Alcoholism: Clinical and Experimental Research, was conducted by researchers in Toronto, Ontario, and Buffalo, New York.