In addition to a greatly increased risk of suicide, teens who experiment with drugs or alcohol are at a greatly elevated risk for a number of mental health conditions. Mental health challenges are always related to increased rates of substance abuse, but it seems as though teens who start using younger and who use more, are far more likely to develop psychiatric conditions that both complicate the treatment of substance abuse, and also often exacerbate substance abuse behaviors.
The younger that kids start experimenting with marijuana the greater their eventual risk for mental health challenges. Marijuana has been conclusively linked with psychosis like conditions and with anxiety and depression.
A recent study comparing the rates of mental health illness in adults with different ages of marijuana use onset revealed that youths who started using marijuana before the age of 12 were almost twice as likely to suffer from mental health challenges as those who waited until the age of 18 before experimenting. Of youths who used before the age of 12, 21% had experienced a mental health challenge in the past year.
Mental illness also exacerbates rates of drug and alcohol abuse amongst teens, and teens that experience depressive symptoms are more than twice as likely to use illicit drugs, and almost twice as likely to use alcohol.
The mind is a fragile thing, and teens who experiment with intoxication and drug or alcohol abuse too often fall victim to concurrent mental health conditions. Although substance abuse increases the risk for psychiatric conditions at any age, the very young are especially susceptible to increased rates of mental health illness with substance abuse.
page last update Aug 05, 2010
