Citation

Pengpid S, Peltzer K. Psychol. Res. Behav. Manag. 2019; 12: 1003-1008.

Affiliation

Deputy Vice Chancellor Research and Innovation Office, North-West University, Potchefstroom, South Africa.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2019, Dove Press)

DOI

10.2147/PRBM.S223624

PMID

31749642

PMCID

PMC6818457

Abstract

AIM: The study aimed to assess the associations between substance use early initiation (<12 years) (smoking cigarettes, alcohol and drug use) with psychological distress among adolescents in five ASEAN countries.

METHODS: Cross-sectional data were analysed from 33,184 school adolescents, with a median age of 14 years, from Indonesia, Laos, Philippines, Thailand and Timor-Leste that took part in the "Global School-Based Student Health Survey (GSHS)" in 2015.

RESULTS: The overall prevalence of pre-adolescent (<12 years) cigarette use was 10.6%, 8.1% pre-adolescent current alcohol use, and 4.2% pre-adolescent drug use initiation. In adjusted multinomial logistic regression analysis, pre-adolescent initiation of cigarette smoking, pre-adolescent initiation of alcohol use, pre-adolescent initiation of drug use and multi-substance pre-adolescent initiation were highly associated with medium (=1) and high (=2-5) psychological distress (of five psychological distress items: no close friends, loneliness, anxiety, suicidal ideation and suicide attempt). Late initiation of cigarette use and late initiation of drug use were not associated with medium and/or high psychological distress.

CONCLUSION: Early prevention programmes should target concurrent early substance use initiation in order to prevent possible subsequent psychological distress.

© 2019 Pengpid and Peltzer.

Language: en

Keywords

ASEAN countries; adolescents; early substance use; psychological distress