This story discusses suicide. If you or someone you know is contemplating suicide, please call or text the National Suicide and Crisis Lifeline at 988.

Yesterday’s vices have lost some favor among Rhode Island’s teens and preteens, a new survey suggests.

And yet cannabis seems to have found a bigger audience — namely among middle schoolers — according to the 2024 Rhode Island Student Survey, which is conducted every two years by the Rhode Island Department of Behavioral Healthcare, Developmental Disabilities & Hospitals (BHDDH) with help from the state’s health and education departments.

Students overall reported using fewer substances of all kinds, but pot consumption rose significantly among the middle-school demographic, with 7.8% using it in the past 30 days, an increase from the 5.4% usage observed by the last survey in 2022. Middle schoolers used cannabis more than any other drug, including alcohol.

“That’s not the good news,” said BHDDH Director Richard Leclerc at a presentation of survey results Tuesday at Classical High School.

Leclerc instead pointed to results that show substance use reported by Rhode Island high school students is largely stagnant or slowly declining. Among high schoolers, for instance, past 30-day use of marijuana dropped from 14.9% to 10.9%.

This year’s report surveyed over 23,000 students in 29 school districts, including Providence for the first time. The online, 30-minute survey featured 81 questions — with several new ones about gambling and cellphone use added this year — and was offered in English and Spanish. Students in grades six through 12 participated voluntarily with parental permission, and each respondent received a brochure with information for resources or support.

Middle and high school students in this year’s survey said they used alcohol, vapes, cigarettes and sedatives at rates smaller than in recent years, and most kids believe that family and friends would disapprove of substance use.

“The numbers you see today show that our prevention efforts are working,” Leclerc said.

Rebecca Elwell, regional director of the state-partnered Newport County Prevention Coalition, agreed. “We work every day to build a safety network for the young people in the state of Rhode Island, through strengthening their positive attributes and addressing the risk factors that young people face,” Elwell said. “Prevention is a science. We use evidence based strategies that have been tested and replicated.”

The peer and parental pressure to not do drugs was reflected in student responses about actual use. Reports of marijuana use in the past 30 days dropped from roughly one in seven high school students to one in nine, while e-cigarette and vape use fell from one in eight to one in 14. Alcohol use showed marked decline among high schoolers, with rates dropping from 14.5% to 10%. Fewer students reported being passengers in cars with impaired drivers. 

Simone Punchak, a senior at Classical High School, told those gathered for Tuesday’s program that her experience as a member of the Mayor’s Youth Prevention Team has taught her “that prevention is not just about ensuring that others are limited from potential risks, but that they are provided with the opportunities for success.” 

“The Rhode Island Student Survey is a powerful tool in this effort,” Punchak said. “The data it provides helps us better understand our challenges and guides us in building stronger programs for the future.”

The data report also crunches the numbers for different regions in Rhode Island, a unique feature important to securing federal funding for prevention efforts. Regional profiles can be found on the BHDDH website. 

The slowly waning rates of substance use among today’s high schoolers, whatever the cause, is even starker when compared to teens at the turn of the millennium. Youth Risk Behavior Survey data from 1997 showed that 36% of Rhode Islander’s high schoolers had been in a car with an impaired driver. In 2024, only 14% of high schoolers said the same on the Rhode Island Student Survey.

But Colleen Judge, director of student assistance services of school-based prevention nonprofit Rhode Island Student Assistant Services, pointed out that some things stay the same. “We need to remember that adolescence is challenging,” she said. “How could you forget?”

Other highlights from the survey included:  

• Eighth and ninth graders comprised 25% and 22% of respondents. High school juniors and seniors responded at rates of 4% and 3%, respectively. Overall, male and female participants were about evenly split at just under half across grade levels. Transgender students and students with other gender identities made up about 4% of survey respondents. 
• Bullying rates dipped a handful of percentage points in the midst of the pandemic in the 2020 survey but have since returned to their pre-pandemic levels. That still didn’t translate to any major increases among high schoolers, but middle schoolers reported a two or three percentage point increase in bullying online or by text. 
• An average of about 38% of students across grades admitted they had “made fun of other people,” while 16% of middle schoolers said they had spread rumors, and another 15% had sent hurtful texts or pictures to a peer.
• Less than 15% of both middle and high school students said they had “considered attempting” suicide. Among the high school students who reported having suicidal thoughts, 35% made an attempt, down from 41% in 2022. (The rate was 35% in 2018.) But middle schoolers who made suicide attempts rose from 45% in 2022 to 46% in this year’s survey.

The appeal of scratch lottery tickets

Gambling and screen time, newly added in this year’s survey questions, couldn’t be compared to past years’ data but both appeared to be relatively popular habits. 

About 21% of students reported they had tried gambling. The most popular form of gambling was scratch lottery tickets. Gifted scratch off tickets accounted for 19% of student gambling habits — outpacing games of chance enjoyed by the young adult crowd, like fantasy sports, which only 5% of high schoolers had bet on.

About half of students said they use their phone between one and five hours a day, although most reported they often spent more time on the devices than they’d like. A troubling 6% of middle schoolers and 4% of high schoolers reported that they spent 16 or more hours daily on their phones.