Seeing a parent drunk dramatically increases the likelihood that a teenager will drink, use marijuana, or smoke cigarettes, according to a national survey released last month.
The survey by the National Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse at Columbia University in New York City shows that, compared with teenagers who have never seen a parent inebriated, teenagers who have seen one or more parents drunk are more than twice as likely to get drunk in a typical month and three times more likely to use marijuana or smoke cigarettes.
The survey also found that more than one-third of the teenagers said they can get prescription drugs to get high within a day, and one-fifth said they could get them within an hour.
The survey was conducted in March and included a random sample of 1,000 12- to 17-year-olds and 452 of their parents.
