Despite its importance, childhood trauma is often not recognized as ?
pathogenic fact that affects the (de)formation of personality and influences
the development of various psychological difficulties and bad habits,
including the likelihood of future psychoactive substance abuse. This study
aimed to examine the relationship between adverse childhood experiences and
substance misuse in adolescence. The research was conducted on a sample of
380 secondary school students (aged 14 to 19 years) from Vojvodina. The
questionnaires used included: the Questionnaire of Sociodemographic
Characteristics and Psychoactive Substance Uses, which was designed for the
purpose of this research, and the Childhood Trauma Questionnaire (CTQ,
Bernstein & Fink, 1998). The research employed the methods of descriptive
statistics, Spearman?s correlation coefficient, and the chi-squared test. A
total of 10.2% of respondents used psychoactive substances less than once a
week, 3.2% used psychoactive substances once a week, and 1.8% used
psychoactive substances every day. In terms of traumatic experiences, only
6.6% of respondents reported having no or minimal trauma, the majority
(62.9%) had a low-to-moderate level of traumatization, while nearly one in
three respondents (30.5%) exhibited a moderate-to-severe or
severe-to-extreme level of traumatization. A significant correlation was
found between the intensity of each form of traumatization and the frequency
of psychoactive substance use, with the correlations being most pronounced
for emotional abuse (r = .38), sexual abuse (r = .35), and total
traumatization (r = .34). The results highlight the importance of preventing
drug abuse in the student population, as well as the need to sensitize and
educate teachers and school counselors to ensure the timely recognition of
traumatization in adolescents, and help prevent or mitigate psychoactive
substance use problems and other mental health issues.