The 1997 Vermont Youth Risk Behavior Survey
Statewide Report
How many Vermont teens drink alcohol or smoke cigarettes? Where do they get alcohol and cigarettes? How many use marijuana or cocaine? How many are sexually active, and of those, how many are using condoms? How many have been threatened at school? How many have contemplated suicide? Finding answers to these questions is vitally important.
This information can put to rest unwarranted fears when the answers are positive; it can mobilize prevention and intervention efforts when the answers are negative; and it can influence the behavior of students by setting norms.
Every two years since 1985, the Department of Health's Office of Alcohol and Drug Abuse Programs and the Department of Education's Comprehensive School Health Program have sponsored a survey of Vermont students.
The Vermont Youth Risk Behavior Survey (YRBS) measures the prevalence of behaviors that contribute to the leading causes of death, disease, and injury among youth. The YRBS is part of a larger effort to help communities promote the "resiliency" of young people by reducing high risk behaviors and increasing healthy behaviors. The YRBS provides accurate information about Vermont students which enables us to:
- monitor trends in their health and risk behaviors
- compare Vermont students with a national sample of students
- plan, evaluate, and improve community programs which prevent health problems and promote healthy behaviors
In 1997, school staff administered the YRBS to over 23,000 eighth to twelfth grade Vermont students in 83 schools representing 48 supervisory unions and two private schools.
For the purposes of this report, data are based on a representative sample of 8,636 Vermont high school and middle school students. Participation by both schools and individual students was completely voluntary. To protect student privacy, the questionnaire was anonymous. Therefore, it is impossible to identify an individual student's responses.