the anti-drug, how well do you know your teen test
 

I was directed to "Parents: the anti-drug" website through a school newsletter, and decided to take a test asking "how well do you know your teen." My son turns 13 in about a month and I really have no doubts about what he's up to. But I know things can change fast, so I decided to check out the test.

The test is here.

I thought that the questions were decent and I answered virtually all of them "never." The only ones I answered "sometimes" to were the questions whether the kid is ever careless with grooming or ever secretive about conversations.

Nevertheless, I got a "medium risk" assessment. I guess these quizzes are just designed to make parents concerned.

Anyway, what do you think of the test? Were the questions useless, or pretty much on target? And (I know this will be taken as a straight line but I'll ask anyway), are there any questions that should have been added?

Re: the anti-drug, how well do you know your teen test
 

I think this test could have been

1. Are you somewhat intelligent? (If no, stop here. If yes, continue to Question 2)

2. Is your child using drugs?



All the questions seems so common sense. Yeah my son is now hanging out with a whole new group, his grades are slipping, and he's always Xing out of AIM conversation when I walk in the room and talking to his friends on the phone about meeting up to "listen to Bob Marley". Think he is on drugs?

Re: the anti-drug, how well do you know your teen test
 

yea this is lame. I answered the questions to how I behaved a couple years ago, and it told me I was HIGH RISK. My grades slipped, I was secretive, lazy, and I hid things from my parents. Standard.

If I'm HIGH RISK then the world is in terrible shape

Re: the anti-drug, how well do you know your teen test
 

Answering "never" to all of them resturns "some risk." So, I'm voting lame.

Re: the anti-drug, how well do you know your teen test
 

Lame.

The first ~10 statements apply to just about every teenager because they're, you know, teenagers.

Re: the anti-drug, how well do you know your teen test
 

Wow, that site is very informative. No propaganda at all. Really. None. It's all fact and Jesus commands you not to do drugs.

Re: the anti-drug, how well do you know your teen test
 

Forget the risk assessment for now.

Can you think of better questions that that would yield more meaningful results?

Re: the anti-drug, how well do you know your teen test
 

Wynton,

just rummage through his things while he's not there. Sure its an invasion of privacy and a breach of trust, but it shows you care.


Although these questions on the test are lame, they are still the basic, good indicators. If parents are genuinely shocked when they learn their kid has been using drugs for more than a couple months, it just mean they've had their heads buried in the sand and ignored the obvious signs.

Re: the anti-drug, how well do you know your teen test
 

[ QUOTE ]
Forget the risk assessment for now.

Can you think of better questions that that would yield more meaningful results?

[/ QUOTE ]
Well obviously it would be a much better system if you said on a scale of 1-10 where 10 is never and 1 is often and it would get progressively more accurate (assuming people were answering questions well) as the number kept on increasing.

Re: the anti-drug, how well do you know your teen test
 

Wynton,

Just do drugs w/ him, that way you know you can control the environment.

Re: the anti-drug, how well do you know your teen test
 

[ QUOTE ]
Forget the risk assessment for now.

Can you think of better questions that that would yield more meaningful results?

[/ QUOTE ]

no, because parents arent objective enough to answer any meaningful question accurately

Re: the anti-drug, how well do you know your teen test
 

tdarko,

my parents knew that nowadays with computers, often a child's first glimpse of sex will be pornography. Given the sick and depraved nature of most porn with the anal gaping, etc. they didn't want me to think that was normal lovemaking. so my mom [censored] me so that she could control the environment.

personally, this was fine with me. my gf was a bit weirded out when i told her. does your drug advice translate to sex?

Re: the anti-drug, how well do you know your teen test
 

These remind me of the questions that are supposed to tell you if you have a gambling problem.

[ QUOTE ]
Have you found:
Evidence of drug paraphernalia such as pipes, rolling papers, etc?

[/ QUOTE ]

LOL, if you find these your teenager might be doing drugs.

Re: the anti-drug, how well do you know your teen test
 

[ QUOTE ]
I think this test could have been

1. Are you somewhat intelligent? (If no, stop here. If yes, continue to Question 2)

2. Is your child using drugs?

[/ QUOTE ]

An even simpler way would be:

1. "How old is your child?"

Then there's a lookup table with probabilities. I mean, seriously, if your kid is over say, 15, and has a reasonable social life, there's about a 95% he's had a beer and 75% chance he's smoked weed. That was the case where I grew up, anyway.

Re: the anti-drug, how well do you know your teen test
 

[ QUOTE ]
tdarko,

my parents knew that nowadays with computers, often a child's first glimpse of sex will be pornography. Given the sick and depraved nature of most porn with the anal gaping, etc. they didn't want me to think that was normal lovemaking. so my mom [censored] me so that she could control the environment.

personally, this was fine with me. my gf was a bit weirded out when i told her. does your drug advice translate to sex?

[/ QUOTE ]

pics of mom please!

Re: the anti-drug, how well do you know your teen test
 

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
tdarko,

my parents knew that nowadays with computers, often a child's first glimpse of sex will be pornography. Given the sick and depraved nature of most porn with the anal gaping, etc. they didn't want me to think that was normal lovemaking. so my mom [censored] me so that she could control the environment.

personally, this was fine with me. my gf was a bit weirded out when i told her. does your drug advice translate to sex?

[/ QUOTE ]

pics of mom please!

[/ QUOTE ]

Have a hard time believing this...

Re: the anti-drug, how well do you know your teen test
 

Noah,

Of course it translates, your mom obviously loves you.

Re: the anti-drug, how well do you know your teen test
 

I answered these questions with regard to how I was in high school. I was a straight A student and still have never drank or had any illegal drugs in my body, but yet this test returned High Risk. My opinion of the test is that it is ridiculous.

Re: the anti-drug, how well do you know your teen test
 

The test is absolutely ridiculous. If your kids not a retard he's not going to make it obvious enough for a test like that to out him anyway. I was smoking and drinking for 5-6 years before my mom had any clue. Pretty sure my dad was on the up and up, probably for the last 2-3 years before my mom.

Re: the anti-drug, how well do you know your teen test
 

shen,

you either underestimate your parents or they're really clueless.

Re: the anti-drug, how well do you know your teen test
 

Neither, I think. My mom was always pretty invasive for the most part. She would go through my room/bag on a somewhat regular basis, and was very attentive to what i said i was doing/who i was going with/where i was going and all that jazz. I mean, i'm a good liar too, so that probably helped, but really, unless you're doing stupid [censored] like either leaving paraphernalia out where they're going to find it, or getting baked and then raiding the fridge in front of them, it's pretty easy to keep parents in the dark.

(on second thought, they might have known i was drinking, because i'd come home hungover, but my mom at least always seemed to believe me when i told her it was jsut from staying up all night watching movies or playing video games.)

Re: the anti-drug, how well do you know your teen test
 

Amusing. This test is the direct opposite of the best scientific evidence to date. Moderate marijuana use in teens is correlated with higher mental health. If your son reaches 15 and he appears well-adjusted, mentally healthy and has a large social group then it is more likely that he is a user, not less.

Based on personal experience fwiw; at university, all of the people I knew who graduated with a first or distinction were occasional or regular drug users. All of the people I knew who were in the anti-drug, I'll-never-use-that camp failed a year and had to repeat it.

Needless to say, if I ever had children and they didn't at least try marijuana then I would be a little concerned.

Re: the anti-drug, how well do you know your teen test
 

[ QUOTE ]
This test is the direct opposite of the best scientific evidence to date. Moderate marijuana use in teens is correlated with higher mental health.

[/ QUOTE ]

I think marijuana is usually fairly harmless for most people, but I have a hard time believing there is any scientific evidence correlating its use with higher mental health.

Are you actually serious about this (or am I too burnt out from years ago to know when I'm being leveled)?

Re: the anti-drug, how well do you know your teen test
 

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
This test is the direct opposite of the best scientific evidence to date. Moderate marijuana use in teens is correlated with higher mental health.

[/ QUOTE ]

I think marijuana is usually fairly harmless for most people, but I have a hard time believing there is any scientific evidence correlating its use with higher mental health.

Are you actually serious about this (or am I too burnt out from years ago to know when I'm being leveled)?

[/ QUOTE ]

I am totally serious. I will attempt to find references if I have time.

I doubt that marijuana causes higher mental health fwiw, I expect that it's the other way around.

Re: the anti-drug, how well do you know your teen test
 

maybe its because the kid who is 16 and sits in his closet crying all the time has a tough time scoring drugs off his imaginary friends.

Re: the anti-drug, how well do you know your teen test
 

Screw some quiz online, I saw the home drug kits on sale at WalMart. Buy one of them and sit them on the kitchen counter, letting your teenager know that at any time, for any reason, they may be asked to take it. That's pretty anti-drug to me, and then you'll know for sure.


T

Re: the anti-drug, how well do you know your teen test
 

Good plan, my parents did this when I was 16. I saw them again about a year later.

Re: the anti-drug, how well do you know your teen test
 

This is stupid. Apparently I would have fallen in the high-risk category in high school and I didn't even drink.

Re: the anti-drug, how well do you know your teen test
 

I'm so [censored] sick of this fear-mongering [censored]. Yeah - most parents suck. So what?

Re: the anti-drug, how well do you know your teen test
 

This is hilarious, I answered never for almost all of the questions except obv standard one and it's "high risk" this really is fear-mongering bull [censored].

Re: the anti-drug, how well do you know your teen test
 

The worst question was "is your teen careless with grooming". That question's backwards. If someone's careless in that regard, it usually means that they're antisocial and are the most likely to be in the minority that doesn't do anything. The test should just be "does your kid have friends?" If so, high-risk. If not, low risk.

Re: the anti-drug, how well do you know your teen test
 

what causes more deaths, teens using drugs? or driving while sober?

Those idiots who are against drugs can shove it. Drugs dont do [censored].

If you drink a handle of vodka, your gunna barf and pass out.

If your gunna smoke a blunt, your gunna end all prodcutivity for the day, and have a peaceful time.

If you eat mushroom your gunna see and hear strange things.

If you rail a few lines of pwder your gunan feel pumped up and energized.

Or youll feel smacked out of your mind and just chill like never before.

Big effing deal. I dont see street full of degenerate junkies, or pot heads, or coke heads, or crack whores, yet I am guessing 50% of the pop has tried some of these drugs. So IMO its a big fuss about nothing.

Re: the anti-drug, how well do you know your teen test
 

well i think that pretty much settles it, you've discovered the final solution to the drug issue!

Re: the anti-drug, how well do you know your teen test
 

If the question is "how do I secretly get something out of my kids that they don't want me to know", then snooping and looking for clues about their behaviour, recent grades, finding rolling papers (duh?) are obvious tells.

If the question is "how do I raise healthy kids", the answer is open and honest communication, a dedication to critical thinking that gets past propaganda, and a scientific and medical understanding of the issues. Telling your kids that if they smoke pot they're going to die isn't beneficial - talking about the reasons people do / do not smoke probably is. You don't need to go Orwellian on their ass.