Substance Use: Prevention and Healthy Living

People report using drugs for a wide variety of reasons. Some people use drugs to feel pleasurable, stimulating, or relaxing effects. Others who experience anxiety, stress, depression, or pain may use drugs to try to feel better. Some people use drugs to try to improve their focus in school or at work or their abilities in sports. Many people—especially young people—use drugs out of curiosity and because of social pressure. The age at which people start using drugs—and whether they continue—depends on many different individual and societal factors across a person’s life.

While many people try drugs at some point in their lives and even continue to use them, only some people develop substance use disorders. No single factor determines whether a person will develop a substance use disorder. These chronic but treatable health conditions are the result of many factors across a person’s life.

Examples of factors that may influence substance use and substance use disorders include:

Individual factors

Age at substance use initiation: Drug use at a young age can influence brain development and behavior in ways that increase the likelihood of going on to use other drugs and developing a substance use disorder. Consequently, people who start to use substances as children and young adolescents are more likely to develop a substance use disorder than are those who first use substances in late adolescence or young adulthood. For this reason, most prevention programs focus on preventing or delaying substance use in youth.

Genetics: Inherited biological factors can play a significant role in a person’s likelihood of using substances and of developing a substance use disorder.

Mental health issues: People with mental illnesses like depression, anxiety, posttraumatic stress disorder, and many other psychiatric conditions are also more likely to use substances and to develop substance use disorders.

Biological sex: Factors related to biological sex—such as different brain structure and function, tissue composition, endocrine, and metabolic functions in males and females—can influence how a person responds to drugs. For example, women use drugs less frequently and in smaller amounts than men, but they can experience the effects more strongly, and substance use in women tends to develop into a substance use disorder more quickly than in men.

Personality: Individual characteristics such as risk-taking, sensation-seeking, aggression, or heightened responses to chronic stress can influence the likelihood of using substances and developing a substance use disorder.

Specific types and patterns of drug use: Use of certain drugs such as opioids, nicotine, and methamphetamine is associated with a higher likelihood of developing a substance use disorder than is use of other drugs like psychedelics. Similarly, injection drug use is more strongly associated with developing a substance use disorder, as more drug is delivered more rapidly to the brain than via other routes of administration.

Family factors

Family relationships: Research shows that growing up in a supportive, stable family environment versus one associated with adverse childhood experiences like trauma, abuse, and neglect can impact a person’s likelihood of problem drug use and of developing substance use disorders later in life. A higher level of parental involvement and young people’s perceptions that parents are aware of their activities have also been found to be protective.

Parental substance use and attitudes: Whether parents use drugs or alcohol and their level of permissiveness or acceptance of substance use influence whether a child or adolescent is likely to use substances.

Community factors

School: Studies show certain aspects of a school environment—such as how often other students use drugs and how connected students feel to their classmates—can influence whether students use or avoid substances.

Peers: Whether an individual’s peers use drugs or disapprove of substance use is a major influence on whether that individual will use substances, particularly during youth.

Neighborhood: Research shows that living in a neighborhood with high levels of poverty or violence is associated with a higher likelihood of using substances. Positive community relationships and environments have been associated with less substance use and less progression from substance use to substance use disorders.

Structural factors

Social: Stigma and discrimination on the basis of race, ethnicity, gender, or other factors can cause chronic stress that makes someone more vulnerable to substance use and to developing substance use disorders.

Economic: Growing up in a household or neighborhood with lower resources can affect children’s brain development in ways that may make them more vulnerable to future substance use disorders. Housing insecurity and limited access to education and employment are also associated with substance use disorders.

Laws and culture: Access to substances, as well as the laws, policies, culture, norms, and attitudes surrounding their use in a society, can influence whether an individual uses substances and experiences related health problems including substance use disorders.

If you or someone you know is struggling with substance use, call or text 988 or chat 988lifeline.org to reach a trained counselor with the 988 Suicide & Crisis Lifeline.

For referrals to treatment programs, call 211 or 833-944- 4673 for the Wisconsin Addiction Recovery Helpline or visit addictionhelpwi.gov.

You can use the Focus on Prevention (PDF) guide from the Substance Abuse Mental Health Services Administration to develop a substance use prevention plan for your community.