Every morning, Brittany Geldert stepped off the bus and bolted through the double doors of Fred Moore Middle School, her nerves already on high alert, bracing for the inevitable. "Dyke." Pretending not to hear, Brittany would walk briskly to her locker, past the sixth-, seventh- and eighth-graders who loitered in menacing packs.
Substance abuse among young people is a much bigger problem than many parents realize. How big? One in 10 kids 12 to 17 years of age are current users of illicit drugs, according to a 2009 government survey.The good news? Parents can also do a lot more than some realize to help protect teens from drugs or alcohol.
Unemployed high school dropout Tremain Hutchinson spent a lot of time talking to young girls on Tagged.com, a teen chat site. Sometimes he was "Mario," sometimes "Quan" or "Money," but Hutchinson, 28, always pretended to be a cute 16-year-old Georgia boy. He used a photo of a younger cousin in the profiles.
A study of the media's impact on adolescents' sexual behavior and values, as well as development of a scientific view on the effects these behaviors will have on adolescents.
