Maternal predictors of comorbid trajectories of cigarette smoking and marijuana use from early adolescence to adulthood

Abstract

This is the first study to examine maternal predictors of comorbid trajectories of cigarette smoking and marijuana use from adolescence to adulthood. Participants (N=806) are part of an on-going longitudinal psychosocial study of mothers and their children. Mothers were administered structured interviews when participants were adolescents, and participants were interviewed at six time waves, from adolescence to adulthood. Mothers and participants independently reported on their relationship when participants were X̄ age 14.1 years. At each time wave, participants answered questions about their cigarette and marijuana use since the previous wave to the present. Latent growth mixture modeling determined the participants’ membership in trajectory groups of comorbid smoking and marijuana use, from X̄ ages 14.1 to 36.6 years. Multivariate logistic regression was used to assess the association of maternal factors (when participants were adolescents) with participants’ comorbid trajectory group membership. Findings showed that most maternal risk (e.g., mother-child conflict, maternal smoking) and protective (e.g., maternal affection) factors predicted participants’ membership in trajectory groups of greater and lesser comorbid substance use, respectively. Clinical implications include the importance of addressing the mother-child relationship in prevention and treatment programs for comorbid cigarette smoking and marijuana use.

The role of general parenting and cannabis-specific parenting practices in adolescent cannabis and other illicit drug use

“…This is consistent with findings from Miller-Day (2008), who found that 'no-tolerance rules' are negatively related to adolescent cannabis use among university students. Apart from these differences between substances, similarities may not be discarded, e.g., settings and motivations for use may be similar and co-occurrence is common (Brook et al, 2012). The abovementioned differences and similarities may explain why tobacco-and alcohol specific rules may be insufficient in explaining adolescent drug use, while cannabis-rules are related to cannabis in a comparable way.…”

“…Furthermore, while co-occurrence rates of tobacco and cannabis use are high (Brook et al, 2012) and tolerant tobacco rules and maternal tobacco use are found to be associated with higher levels of adolescent cannabis use (Brook et al, 2012;de Looze et al, 2012a), earlier studies have not taken these factors into account when studying cannabis-specific parenting.…”

Trajectories of Substance Use Among Young American Indian Adolescents: Patterns and Predictors

“…Some report few substance use trajectories, including a large normative group (low use, slight to moderate increases over time) and one or two smaller groups exhibiting more dramatic escalations in use (Flory, Lynam, Milich, Leukefeld, & Clayton, 2004; Li, Duncan, & Hops, 2001; Spaeth, Weichold, Silbereisen, & Weisner, 2010). Others report multiple trajectories, distinguished by varying levels of use at baseline and rates of change over time (Brook, Rubenstone, Zhang, & Brooko, 2012; Martino, Ellickson, & McCaffrey, 2009; Orlando, Tucker, Ellickson, & Klein, 2005; Van Der Vorst, Vermulst, Meeus, Dekovis, & Engels, 2009). Although important, these findings do not necessarily illuminate the substance use patterns that characterize AI adolescents.…”

Comorbid trajectories of substance use as predictors of Antisocial Personality Disorder, Major Depressive Episode, and Generalized Anxiety Disorder

“…Comorbid substance use may stem from both genetic and psychosocial factors (1,9,10). Increasing evidence points to a genetic overlap in the propensity to use tobacco, alcohol, and marijuana (10,11), and factors such as behavioral undercontrol, poor familial relationships, affiliation with deviant peers, and drug accessibility may also predispose the individual to heterogeneous substance use (1,12,13). Therefore, a better understanding of distinct patterns of comorbid substance use may be more practically relevant to prevention and treatment programming than focusing on the use of an individual substance, e.g., marijuana.…”