The One Percent Rule
I have spent a lot of time discussing social media, plus drug and alcohol use, and abuse, with young students. I have probably had hundreds of such conversations, if not thousands, over the years of teaching, so I was intrigued by the headline: Unprecedented decline in teen drug use continues, surprising experts. My experience from the personal open conversations is that drugs, smoking, alcohol and technology abuse is rampant amongst a large number of students. However, according to the article and other reading, a generation stereotypically tethered to indulgence and impulsivity is seemingly sidestepping the vices their predecessors grappled with.
Yet, it seems the teens aren't exactly living a life of monastic asceticism. Have they simply replaced one form of escapism with another? Instead of getting high in the park, they're getting lost in the digital ether, tethered to their smartphones like a modern-day version of Huxley's soma-fueled populace. This certainly seems true of my detailed discussions with 18-24 year-olds, but as with most headlines, the devil is in the details, and beneath this surprising statistic lies a narrative begging for meticulous exploration, such as that by Jon Haidt.
The decline in teen drug use, is very heartening, and reflects a societal shift in distractions and dependencies. Of courses, one cannot discuss this trend without confronting its probable harbinger, the omnipresence of technology. Could it be that smartphones, social media platforms, and gaming ecosystems have replaced the lure of substances? Some argue that technology acts as a digital narcotic, offering a hyper-stimulating, albeit synthetic, connection to the world.
