Most American teenagers are staying away from alcohol, marijuana, cigarettes and vapes as part of a lasting effect of the COVID-19 pandemic -- while just one vice is making ground, according to a national survey released Tuesday.
Roughly two-thirds of high school seniors said they hadn't drunk alcohol or used marijuana or tobacco products in the past month -- marking the greatest percentage of sober teens since the annual survey began documenting substance use in 2017.
Even fewer underclassmen are turning to substances.
The federally-funded "Monitoring the Future" survey, based on responses from 24,000 students in grades 8, 10 and 12 across the country, found that 80% of 10th graders hadn't recently used any of the above drugs or booze and 90% of 8th graders had abstained.
But the one outlier among illicit substances teens are turning to at a higher rate is nicotine pouches such as the popular brand Zyn. Still, the amount of 12th graders using Zyn and other pouches increased from just 3% in 2023 to 6% this year, according to the survey.
Researchers believe that the decline in teenage substance use is a lasting effect of pandemic lockdowns that limited social gatherings -- and dampened peer pressure.
High school freshmen are often turned on to drugs and alcohol by their older peers, the researchers noted.
But the freshmen during the pandemic era were forced to avoid large gatherings and social events and never started drinking and smoking. As they got older, they didn't have the experience with booze and marijuana to influence the underclassmen, researchers theorized.
"The pandemic stopped the cycle of new kids coming in and being recruited to drug use," said the survey orchestrator, Richard Miech, of the University of Michigan.
The trend surprised researchers who thought they'd see teen usage jump back up after the lockdowns and restrictions on social gatherings were lifted.
"I think everyone expected at least a partial rebound," Miech said.