The accurate identification of risk factors is central to the development of effective
efforts to prevent young people from using alcohol, tobacco and other substances.
To date, a key limitation of the prevention literature has been the paucity of research
that examines the extent to which substance use risk factors identified in studies
of white adolescents generalize to African American (and other non-white) youth.
In the absence of research on race differences in risk factor exposure and vulnerability, current preventive interventions are based on the implicit assumptions
that 1) the risk factors for African American and white adolescents’ substance
use are identical; and 2) that African American and white adolescents are equally
exposed and equally vulnerable to these risk factors. The purpose of the present
study was to begin to examine empirically the “equal exposure and vulnerability”
assumption. Specifically, the paper used Hawkins, Catalano and Millers’ widely
cited 1992 article on risk and protective factors for adolescent and young adult
substance use as a framework within which to review past risk factor research and
as a guide to identify risk factors to examine for race differences in exposure and/or
vulnerability. Based upon our review of the existing literature and our analysis of
data from the University of Michigan’s Monitoring the Future study, we conclude
that the simple assumption that African American and white youth are equally
exposed and vulnerable to the same risk factors is not correct. In fact, we found
that African American and white seniors’ differed significantly in their exposure
to more than half of the 55 risk factors examined.