OBJECTIVE To identify predictors of perceived (a) risk of harm associated with inhalant use and (b) intention to use inhalants among adolescent inhalant users. METHOD Participants were 279 lifetime inhalant users (M(age)=15.5, 84% male) identified in a statewide survey of 723 adolescents in Missouri Division of Youth Services' residential care for antisocial conduct. Youth completed interview...

Inhalants are a group of substances that have mind-altering or psychoactive effects when inhaled. The intoxicating effect makes them liable to abuse. Volatility is the common physical characteristic shared by all inhalants. Inhalant abuse is a worldwide problem. The substances abused are numerous, cheap, legal and easily available (Table 1). They are usually emptied into a plastic bag or a used...

Inhalant use by children leads to poor performance in school and has been observed to precede substance use later in life. There is paucity of data on inhalant use among school children in India, particularly in the Northeast region of the country. We determined the prevalence and documented inhalant use characteristics among schoolchildren in the Northeast region of India. This cross sectional...

OBJECTIVE To compare the rate of drug use prevalence and to investigate opinions regarding such use among undergraduate students at the University of São Paulo--São Paulo campus in 1996 and again in 2001. METHODS Both studies followed the same procedures of sampling and data collection. A random sample of undergraduate students, divided into the areas Humanities, Exact Sciences and Biologic S...

Inhaled substances can modify behavior by their toxic action, or because they are discriminable events, or because they can support or suppress behavior. They can be used as discriminative stimuli at concentrations above the olfactory threshold. Inhalants can elicit unconditioned reflexes. As aversive stimuli, they can be studied in respondent conditioning experiments (e.g. conditioned suppress...

The sites of uptake and retention of inhalants within the respiratory tract influence which tissues are susceptible to damage. Physical and chemical properties of inhalants, including size, water:air and oil:water partition coefficients, and reactivity or susceptibility to metabolism are the major factors that affect deposition and retention. The high metabolic capacity of the cells of the olfa...

Alcohol, marijuana, and inhalants are the easiest drugs to obtain, but all drugs are available to some students. Younger students felt that inhalants were easier to get than marijuana. Availability does not have a major effect on use; if there is motivation to use, drugs are available. Perceived harm is linked to use, and 8th-grade reservation youth show the lowest belief that drugs are harmful...

Nitrite inhalants have been commonly abused substances in the United States. Nitrite inhalants and AIDS was a popular topic in the early 1980s, when the cause of AIDS was not known. With the discovery of HIV, concern about nitrite use in the USA waned. However, nitrite inhalant use is associated with behavioral relapse and HIV transmission among gay men, with decreased lymphocyte counts and nat...

More than 22 million Americans age 12 and older have used inhalants, and every year more than 750,000 use inhalants for the first time. Despite the substantial prevalence and serious toxicities of inhalant use, it has been termed "the forgotten epidemic." Inhalant abuse remains the least-studied form of substance abuse, although research on its epidemiology, neurobiology, treatment, and prevent...