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5.0 PERCEIVED IMPACT OF DRUG EDUCATION
This section examines the perceived impact of school drug education on young people. Firstly, it begins by describing perceived impact on knowledge about drugs (5.1). Secondly, it explores perceived impact on emotions, values and attitudes regarding drugs (5.2). Finally, it examines perceived impact on skills and behaviour (5.3).
It should be stressed that examining the impact of any intervention, influence or piece of information from the perception of the recipient poses challenges; disentangling the effects of different influences on people's attitudes and knowledge is always difficult, and respondents are not always able to identify whether a particular phenomenon has had an impact on them, nor to articulate its effects. In advertising research, for example, it is common for respondents to state that they are "not influenced" by advertising and to be reluctant to admit that it may shape their decisions. Therefore, while young people's face-value views on whether drug education had an impact on them are important, its possible impact or influence must also to some extent be inferred from, for example, what they recall particularly vividly or what seems to have engaged them emotionally.
5.1 Knowledge
Unsurprisingly, given the strong emphasis on information provision in drug education lessons, much of the learning and impact of school drug education seemed to be in terms of drug knowledge. Respondents of all ages generally found information about drugs interesting, and felt they had gained useful knowledge from it. The fact that many older respondents, including school leavers, were able to recall particular pieces of information, such as the content of particular videos or talks, in relative detail suggested that information had struck them as new and interesting at the time, and had remained salient. Although drugs were still a fairly remote concept for those still at primary school, they too found the information relevant and interesting. Some children anticipated using this information in the future, when drugs became a more salient issue for them. Even respondents who were somewhat critical of drug education felt that in general it was useful and an important part of their education.
Some kinds of drug information were perceived to be more useful and engaging than others. For example, respondents tended to find the information that they were given about the street names for different drugs and their "special" effects on the body interesting and helpful. Information about the physiological effects of some drugs (eg. hallucinations) was "scary" and off-putting to some respondents:
"Why would we take it if we knew that was going to happen to you?"
Male, P7, School B, Primary, Statutory
"Like I think there was one [video], well we watched it in my registration class, and it was one about a girl that took drugs and she got addicted and stuff. And her friends and her parents were arriving and stuff and then she stopped or something, like gradually stopped and then her friends wouldn't come back and then she got so depressed she basically killed herself. So that kind of scares you because you know that, because I mean all these things you hear."
Female, S4, School E, Secondary, Statutory
Respondents appeared particularly to have benefited from hearing other people's first-hand accounts of the details of drug taking, especially through videos. As noted in section 4.0, these were perceived to provide insights into what 'actually happens', in 'real life', something perceived to be lacking in more factual lessons. Respondents seemed particularly to have been struck by and to have remembered police accounts of drug-related activity, particularly information about the different substances - "talcum powder", "kitchen cleaner" - that drug dealers mix with illicit drugs to make them go further.
"It was like, you don't know what you are getting. Like an ecstasy tablet might be washing powder."
Female, 19-20, School E, Secondary, Statutory
In contrast to the above knowledge, information about the legal consequences and classifications of 'harder' drugs was felt by some to be less personally relevant and useful.
"It was useless telling us it was Class A or Class B. It is not as if we are all going to become dealers."
Female, 19-20, School G, Primary & Secondary, Independent
More useful was information about drugs which respondents were likely to use. Even school leavers remembered learning about alcohol content, and spoke of how this information made them reflect on their own drinking behaviour:
"They'll like give you like a glass and say, 'How much would you think a nip of vodka would be?'.....and it will be far too much and it will actually tell you how many - was in it and it would make you think, 'Oh, wait a minute, I'm drinking too much.'"
Female, 17-18, School D, Secondary, Statutory
Despite the strong emphasis on information in drug education, several respondents still felt there were gaps in the information they were given, or that a different emphasis in the information would have been more helpful. For example, one male respondent felt that there was not enough of a basic introduction to drugs, and that assumptions were made about the extent to which younger pupils had really grasped the concept of drugs before they were taught about them:
"In first year, you're sitting at the table, they say 'Drugs are bad.' You're like, 'Yes, no problem. What's a drug?'. They didn't even tell you what a drug was. They just said, 'Drugs are no good for you'".
Male, 17-18, School F, Secondary, Statutory
Several respondents felt that they received limited coverage of the effects of drugs. What they seemed to mean by this was not so much general information about how different categories of drugs worked (eg. stimulants, depressants), but very specific information which they could picture in the context of a real person.
"They never really told you what happens to your body. I don't remember being told that, which is probably the most important part."
Female, 19-20, School G, Primary & Secondary, Independent
"In my opinion, if you actually want somebody to get off drugs, show them the actual real effect it has on them, because actually there's a mental picture in their mind… and I'm talking about the actual effect of it, what it actually does to the brain, what it does to your organs and what it can do to your life."
Male, S5-S6, School I, Secondary, Special Educational Needs
There was also a desire for more information about the human and social aspects of drug taking, again, it seemed, to help respondents bring relatively abstract information to life.
"You didn't get told what people do with them, where they use them and the different kinds of users."
Female, 19-20, School G, Primary & Secondary, Independent
Older respondents identified a need for information about sources of help.
"They could have said if you are going to fall into that then you can do this and you can do that or you can ring this number."
Female, 17-18, School D, Secondary, Statutory
Although respondents appeared to acquire knowledge from their drug education, they perceived limited progression in the depth and complexity of information from one year to the next. The content of drug education seemed to change very little from late primary to secondary school, in respondents' eyes. This was linked to a perception, described in section 3.1, that drug education was despite its frequency, somewhat fragmentary. It was perceived not so much as an integrated whole, but rather as odd lessons that were repeated throughout school. There was little sense of building upon learning in previous years, or of the information and messages becoming more sophisticated as they grew older to reflect the increasing complexity of their lives, their social interactions and their relationships with drugs. Instead, pupils felt like they were getting the same lessons over and over again, and this made drug education feel boring and repetitive:
"It's the same stuff, year after year."
Male, 17-18, School H, Secondary, Independent
"They tell you the same thing again when you do it the next year. They do it again. You just kind of switch off when they start talking about drugs again because you hear it so many times."
Female, S4, School E, Secondary, Statutory
"I don't think it goes in any more depth than what it does the first time round."
Female, S4, School E, Secondary, Statutory
Only a few perceived, in hindsight, that information had been developed, or that there had been subtle shifts in the tone and emphasis of drug education as they progressed through the school. For example, one boy said that although the main message underpinning drug education at primary school had been 'just say no', the message was modified for older pupils:
"They are saying that in primary school just say no to the stuff and they scream no at you. But they know not to do that now."
Male, S2, School E, Secondary, Statutory
"They go over and they add a couple of things. Basically enhancing our knowledge."
Male, 17-18, School E, Secondary, Statutory
5.2 Emotions, Values and Attitudes
Although much of the impact of school drug education appeared to have been in terms of knowledge, it was apparent that it also, to a lesser extent, had an impact on feelings and emotions about drugs. Real-life accounts that portrayed the negative consequences of drug use, appeared to have a particular impact on young people's attitudes towards drugs. Videos and drama productions which brought to life the social and emotional consequences of drug use were often recalled many years later, suggesting that they had resonated with and engaged young people.
This seemed particularly true of videos which featured testimonials from ex-users or the families of young people who had suffered or died as a result of drug taking. Respondents found personal accounts to be particularly memorable:
"I always remember the one with the Heroin overdose and she died."
Male, 17-18, School E, Secondary, Statutory
As described in section 4.2, drama performances and videos which were perceived as 'true' in the sense of relating to real people, in real situations, were compelling. They engaged young people's attention, and provoked a range of emotional responses, particularly among females. For some, true life, detailed accounts of the impact on families helped them to imagine and appreciate the potential magnitude of becoming involved with drugs.
"When you get a true story you can tell it's true by the tone that it's in because of the family members and the details, so you listen to it and you think that could actually happen and that's really bad."
Female, S4, School E, Secondary, Statutory
Others found themselves imagining the impact of parents and sympathising with their feelings of distress and grief.
"It puts you off because you think back to the videos and you see the parents and all that."
Female, 17-18, School D, Secondary, Statutory
"It makes me not want to do it."
Female, S3, School H, Secondary, Independent
Those who had seen the Leah Betts video or heard a talk by Mr Betts had clearly been affected by the experience.
"It was like hard hitting…people crying."
Male, 17-18, School H, Secondary, Independent
Another potential impact of school drug education was on values and beliefs about drug users. Although the previous section has shown that young people often perceived a mismatch between what they were taught in class and what they perceived around them, particularly in terms of stereotypically negative perceptions of drug users, there was also some evidence that school drug education could positively challenge young people's perceptions of drug users. One group of older respondents from a fairly affluent community said that lessons that they had received at school - as well as meeting people who use drugs in their everyday lives - had shown them that drug users come from all different kinds of backgrounds and that even fairly intelligent and respectable individuals get involved with drugs. They recalled a lesson ran by a local drugs worker who was based at a drug rehabilitation unit. One of the main purposes of this lesson was to challenge stereotypes about the types of people that become involved with drugs:
"He showed pictures of a slide show which showed these faces and you had to stop it at a face and you had to say whether you thought this person was a drug addict or not. Sometimes people looked dodgy…… … they're on drugs. Then they had a respectable looking woman in a suit. This woman was doing cocaine and ecstasy at the weekend. That was actually the best thing I could remember cause it showed you that it wasn't just the neds that were doing drugs. It was actually everyday people that you see all the time. It goes on without you even knowing it goes on."
Female, 19-20, School G, Primary & Secondary, Independent
This information was useful to these respondents because it increased their empathy for drug users and made them less dismissive of the information that they were given about drugs. However, this was one of the few findings suggesting an apparent impact on what could be considered normative beliefs about drugs and drug users. Given the relatively limited attention apparently paid to norms in drug education lessons (see the Observation research and section 3.2 above), this is perhaps unsurprising.
As described in section 4.0, for those respondents who were uninterested in or anti-drugs, school drug education potentially supported and bolstered their existing attitudes. Respondents felt that drug education served to reinforce their beliefs about drugs and strengthen their intentions not to become involved with them - other than alcohol or tobacco. In many cases, attitudes towards drug use seemed to be determined by a range of other factors, particularly their family background, with school education seeming to play a fairly minor supporting role. For some, however, school education did help them to clarify their thinking about drug use.
"I would say it was difficult to avoid it and trying to remember what was taught was really hard, but it helped me make up my mind."
Male, 17-18, School E, Secondary, Statutory
This seemed to be less the case among more disadvantaged respondents who were in closer proximity to drugs and had some first hand experiences of them. Although these respondents echoed messages they had been taught about drugs - "drugs are bad", "drugs are stupid" - it did not seem that they particularly believed them, and their accounts of their own lives and experiences suggested that there was a gulf between what they were taught and their own feelings and actions.
5.3 Skills and Behaviour
As shown in section 3.2, relatively few respondents recalled lessons which had specifically attempted to teach them skills to deal with drug offer situations. Those who had received advice or training about how to deal with drug offers said they found this information helpful. Younger respondents had particularly good recall of lessons about "resisting drug offers", perhaps because it is an approach that is more commonly used at the primary school stage. Although drugs were not yet a salient issues for them, they appreciated that this kind of information could prove useful to them in the future, and several thought they could see themselves apply advice if they were ever in a situation where they were offered drugs.
"Well it is something you need to know about. Well we've said we have never been in a situation like that but that doesn't mean you are never going to be. The fact they actually gave you things to do to get out of a situation….that was good."
Female, P7, School C, Primary, Statutory
Older respondents seemed less likely to feel that they had acquired useful skills for dealing with drug offer situations. Those who could recall having received lessons dealing with issues of peer pressure and choice perceived that the lessons had been lacking in practical advice and skills.
"They talked about peer pressure but they didn't really say how to deal with it."
Female, S4, School E, Secondary, Statutory
"Like you were taught about peer pressure, it never says 'Do this, do that.'"
Male, 17-18, School F, Secondary, Statutory
These individuals expressed some uncertainty about how to deal with drug offers and said that they would have found this kind of advice useful:
"Yes, they could actually tell you what to do, instead of saying, "Don't take drugs. Right, that's the end of that."
Male, 17-18 School F, Secondary, Statutory
"More practical advice. Because it tells you all this stuff but it doesn't tell you how to get out of these situations, because you don't necessarily know what to do…."
Female, S2, School F, Secondary, Statutory
Another perceived gap was in relation to skills which might be useful to those young people who had already tried drugs and wanted to exert control over their behaviour. Unsurprisingly this was more relevant to older respondents. However, they perceived that the underlying assumption in drug education had been that young people were not using drugs and should not use drugs, therefore there was little or no recognition that skills to prevent occasional experimental use from escalating into more regular use could be helpful.
"They don't focus on as well is that they say, 'Don't do this, don't do that', they don't suggest what to do if you're already doing stuff like that and how to stop and how to not to do this and stuff like that."
Female, 17-18, School H, Secondary, Independent
"I don't think they told you enough about what to do and how you can stop it, they just tell you that it's bad and this will happen if you start doing drugs, this is what's going to happen to you."
Female, S4, School E, Secondary, Statutory
Drug education's potential impact on skills and behaviour seemed to be limited by a failure to help respondents link and apply information to their own lives: to put it into practice. The relative success of videos and dramas in engaging attention is perhaps explained by their ability to provide pupils with a bridge between information about consequences and their own experiences: they could project themselves into specific situations, imagine the fall-out for themselves and their own families, and consider the implications for their own future behaviour.
However, in many lessons it seemed that pupils were not encouraged, or did not feel that they were encouraged, actively to reflect on how they themselves could use or benefit from the information they were given. This perhaps lay behind some of the complaints that drug education was not 'real' enough, or that respondents "could not relate to it", or that something was "missing" in what they were being taught. The older female respondent below hinted at this, explaining that it would have been easier to relate to information about drugs if lessons had helped pupils to make the link between the information and their own experiences, and to project themselves imaginatively into plausible situations where the information would be relevant.
"You wouldn't, you see the best way is to portray yourself in that situation, what would you do and relate to your own life and stuff you've done. You couldn't really do that."
Female, 17-18, School H, Secondary, Independent
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