%0 Journal Article
%T A Lifespan Developmental-Stage Approach to Tobacco and Other Drug Abuse Prevention
%A Steve Sussman
%J ISRN Addiction
%D 2013
%R 10.1155/2013/745783
%X At least by informal design, tobacco and other drug abuse prevention programs are tailored to human developmental stage. However, few papers have been written to examine how programming has been formulated as a function of developmental stage throughout the lifespan. In this paper, I briefly define lifespan development, how it pertains to etiology of tobacco and other drug use, and how prevention programming might be constructed by five developmental stages: (a) young child, (b) older child, (c) young teen, (d) older teen, and (e) adult (emerging, young-to-middle and older adult substages). A search of the literature on tobacco and other drug abuse prevention by developmental stage was conducted, and multiple examples of programs are provided for each stage. A total of 34 programs are described as examples of each stage (five-young children, 12-older children, eight-young teens, four-older teens, and five-adults). Implications for future program development research are stated. In particular, I suggest that programming continue to be developed for all stages in the lifespan, as opposed to focusing on a single stage and that developmentally appropriate features continues to be pursued to maximize program impact. 1. Introduction Lifespan development refers to the neurobiological (e.g., maturation, aging), cognitive (e.g., motivation, reasoning), microsocial (e.g., family, peer group), and macrosocial-level (e.g., socio-cultural, mass media) events, and their inter-relationships, that occur across one¡¯s life. The vicissitudes in which one interacts with the world, impacting on the world and being impacted by it, is a function of one¡¯s developmental age or stage [1, 2]. Influences on individuals vary over the lifespan and may direct one¡¯s developmental course. For example, self-esteem tends to increase from adolescence until 50 years of age and then begins to decrease, and it impacts depression symptoms, relationships, job satisfaction, and to a lesser extent, physical health, throughout the life course [3]. Also, behavior-response contingencies are learned throughout the life-span, which vary as a function of environmental demands and physical capacity, and contingency-based goal striving is associated with higher self-esteem [2]. Various general theoretical stages of development have been delineated among children and adults [4, 5]. As an example, Piaget [6] observed general stages of cognitive and intellectual development that occurred during the life course of children. These include a Sensorimotor stage (development of motor coordination and object
%U http://www.hindawi.com/journals/isrn.addiction/2013/745783/