Health Unit Responses
1. Sometimes media can have a bad influence when it comes to drug and alcohol use, for example in some music they talk about drug and alcohol which can be fictitious, that is why is very important to see what youth are watching or listening to because they can see something and try to imitate it. Now in days most of the youths have a cellphone so they are more accessible to social media which can make them more vulnerable.

2. Media influences many different things to children at such a young age. Children are like sponges, they will soak up anything you say anything you do – just anything that is a mimicking behavior too. Growing up, I had to learn about D.A.R.E (drug abuse resistance education). It helps “promote” to children to not drink alcohol or use tobacco or drugs. Some followed it, and some didn’t. But I definitely think television and music also play a major role with it’s portray of drugs and alcohol. Think about some of the music you all listen to… some of it encounters smoking marijuana, and “popping” pills. When kids hear music, they listen to the lyrics and would most likely repeat it. Kind of like it’s your favorite song and you know every single word to it. Even on television; movies especially. Whether it’s from the 1980’s or now, you’ll see some character in the moving smoking a cigarette, doing illegal drugs, or simply having a cocktail or beer. That’s why there are ratings on movies now, Rated R, MA, PG-13, PG, and so on. I also believe peer pressure plays a role within a childs life at some point, I’ve been there many times. As the typical saying is to “look cool” when smoking a joint, or having a sip of alcohol. But it’s not. I’ve seen many people go down after being involved with that stuff, it’s sad to see it and also witness it, how much a person can change throughout the years of being involved with the subsances they used. Magazines nowadays portray marijuana right on the front page cover, they have articles of famous people being apart of that stuff, with whatever substances they took. For instance, a child is a huge fan of Robert Downey Jr., that child see’s news articles of Downey suffering from addicition, cocaine, heroin, marijuana and alcohol. Sometime’s it’ll make the child want to follow in their idols footsteps, and of course you’d have a child who’d stay away from it entirely.Many different factors of little details can have such a big impact on young children.

3. Young people experimentation with drugs and alcohol is not a new phenomenon; nevertheless, social networking sites are providing new and dangerous avenues for teenagers to be introduced to substances. Teens are especially sensitive to the impacts of everything they see on social media because they are particularly receptive to peer pressures and temptation. Sites like Instagram, Facebook, and Snapchat expose children to both famous and ordinary individuals participating in dangerous drug and alcohol-related activities.

4. The media has a big influence on drug and alcohol use among the youth. Nowadays, it seems like the youth are only influenced by social media, which is problematic for many reasons. Other than social media, we see advertisements for drug and alcohol use online, outside, on television, and many other places. When it comes to the youth actually using drugs and alcohol, music, movies, and social media are the only real influencers there. Even so, the real reasons youth would use the substances would come from their environmental surrounding factors, the choices they make and who they chose to surround themselves with; media has the least substantial correlation when compared to other influences. The only media parents have to worry about is social media, the amount of false information and ideologies that could unrealisingly be implanted in your childs values and beliefs is alarming. The freedom of speech is definitely manipulated on social media platforms, and we should have the freedom to be able to do just that, but social media users seem to have turned it into a socially and psychologically manipualtive warzone, that puts our children at risk more than anything.

5. I think a great example of media influence on youth is the show’s Euphoria. You can see one of the main characters being affected by drugs. While the other characters use it but are not addicted to drugs. This could either trigger the youth or push them away from wanting to do drugs. Many adolescents are influenced into assuming this is just part of life to use drugs. The kind of correlation between media and youth drug use is a confusing one. For example, If you are watching a television show on MTV you might see the characters or celebrities smoking or drinking different items. As soon as there’s a commercial break, a media campaign showing why young people should not do drugs and bringing awareness to illicit drugs.