Posted on: Thursday, August 21, 2003

Kids learn about alcohol, drugs from parents' habits

By Samantha Critchell
Associated Press

Most parents know sooner or later they will have to talk to their children about the dangers of using tobacco, alcohol and drugs.

Parents also know the timing of these discussions is tricky: They want to get to their youngsters before there is a problem, but they certainly don't want to spark curiosity about something the children hadn't thought about yet.

What many well-intentioned grown-ups don't know, though, is that some youngsters who are still in diapers are participating in these sophisticated, nuanced and important conversations — they're the listeners. They pay attention to just about every word that comes out of their parents' mouths and they carefully observe the daily routine of the adults in their lives.

"Talking to kids about substance abuse — it's less about sitting down and having a conversation about drugs and more about setting a good example in the way you live your life," says Gilbert Botvin, director of the Institute for Prevention Research at Cornell University Medical College.

"Kids do learn much more from observing behaviors and attitudes of their parents than from what their parents actually say to them.

" 'Do as I say, not as I do' doesn't really work."

Alcohol often is the hardest to deal with because it is served in most homes, which makes availability an issue from the get-go.

Also, Botvin says, it's difficult for children to draw the line of distinction that their parents do between "acceptable drinking," usually occasional or social use, versus abuse.

The way alcohol is used is also important. It's probably less detrimental for a child to see parents have a glass of wine with dinner nightly as long as it's part of the enjoyment of a family meal than for the child to see parents pour a stiff drink — even if it's once a month — while complaining they're stressed out or had a bad day, Botvin says.

From a very early age, even before preschool, children should be learning coping and social skills because it often is a lack of such skills that leads to substance abuse, says Botvin, who created the LifeSkills program for parents and schools.

"By developing competent, capable, self-assured kids, as kids get older and get exposed to more high-risk situations, they'll handle it better," he says.

Once children head off to kindergarten, parents will have less influence and peers become more important, according to Botvin, but this age group likely will gravitate toward friends who have similar backgrounds and dispositions.

By the third and fourth grades, parents should take an active interest in knowing exactly which friends their children are spending the most time with and what sort of environment they were raised in, he advises.

"Role modeling is so important, even with legal drugs," says Jeanette Friedman, director of adolescent services at the New York office of the Caron Foundation, a nonprofit addiction center based in Wernersville, Pa. For example, she says, children of smokers are more likely to smoke; they might even find tobacco to have a comforting smell if they associate it with people who love and care for them.

Drugs shouldn't ever be a taboo subject in a family's home but shouldn't be approached differently than other important family safety topics, Friedman says.

"I would not be in favor of talking about 'drugs' with a 4-, 5-, or 6-year-old because they don't understand what drugs are in the abstract," Friedman says, "but what they will understand is a warning not to go into the medicine cabinet and a warning: 'Don't take your friend's medicine because it's not for you.' "

Friedman cautions not to scare the children. "You'd never say to a young child, 'Don't talk to strangers because they might kidnap you and then kill you.' You just say, 'Don't talk to strangers.' "

She says any conversation with a youngster about a potential hazard should be couched with reassurance and love. "You need to respond to kids' immediate needs, not what they might face 10 years from now."

That said, parents also need to be aware of warning signs of problems on the horizon.

Cigarette smoking is "a big red light," Friedman says, because it's usually the first step of self-medication. It's a sign the child enjoys a surge of a pleasurable feeling.

When children ask parents about their past with drugs, alcohol and tobacco, parents should give age-appropriate and limited responses, Friedman and Botvin say.