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U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Office of Disease Prevention and Health Promotion

Reduce the proportion of adolescents who drank alcohol in the past month — SU‑04 Data Methodology and Measurement

On this page:  About the National Data  |  Methodology  |  History

About the National Data

Data

Data Source:  National Survey on Drug Use and Health (NSDUH), SAMHSA

Baseline: 9.0 percent of adolescents aged 12 to 17 years reported alcohol use in the past 30 days in 2018

Target: 6.3 percent

Numerator
Number of adolescents aged 12 to 17 years who reported using any alcohol during the past 30 days.
Denominator
Number of adolescents aged 12 to 17 years.
Target-setting method
Percentage point improvement
Target-setting method details
Percentage point improvement from the baseline using Cohen's h effect size of 0.10.
1
Target-setting method justification
Trend data were evaluated for this objective, but it was not possible to project a target because Healthy People 2030 Workgroup Subject Matter Experts (SMEs) expected a slowdown in decline (i.e., nonlinear trend) even though prevention and intervention efforts continue. A percentage point improvement was calculated using Cohen's h effect size of 0.1. This method was used because it was a statistically significant improvement from the baseline and the SMEs viewed this as an ambitious yet achievable target.

Methodology

Questions used to obtain the national baseline data

(For additional information, please visit the data source page linked above.)

From the 2018 National Survey on Drug Use and Health:

Numerator:
Have you ever, even once, had a drink of any type of alcoholic beverage? Please do not include times when you only had a sip or two from a drink.
  1. Yes
  2. No
How long has it been since you last drank an alcoholic beverage?
  1. Within the past 30 days - that is, since [DATE]
  2. More than 30 days ago but within the past 12 months
  3. More than 12 months ago

Methodology notes

Alcohol use by adolescents aged 12 to 17 years is defined as using alcohol in the past month. The answers for each of the substances are examined for each respondent. Persons are considered to have used alcohol if they report any use in the past 30 days.

History

Comparable HP2020 objective
Modified, which includes core objectives that are continuing from Healthy People 2020 but underwent a change in measurement.
Changes between HP2020 and HP2030
This objective differs from Healthy People 2020 objective SA-13.1 in that objective SA-13.1 tracked adolescent-reported use of alcohol or illicit drugs during the past 30 days, while this objective tracks adolescent-reported use of alcohol during the past 30 days.

1. Effect size h=0.1 was chosen to correspond with 10% improvement from a baseline of 50%.