The University of Michigan Institute for Social Research
Sponsored by:
The National Institute on Drug Abuse National Institutes of Health
Funding
This publication was written by the principal investigators and staff of the Monitoring the Future project with funding from the National Institute on Drug Abuse (research grants R01DA001411 and R01DA016575).
The findings and conclusions in this report do not necessarily represent the views of the National Institute on Drug Abuse or the National Institutes of Health.
Public Domain Notice
All materials appearing in this volume are in the public domain and may be reproduced or copied, whether in print or in non-print media including derivatives, in any reasonable manner, without permission from the authors. If you plan to modify the material, please indicate that changes were made and contact MTF at [email protected] for verification of accuracy.
https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
Recommended Citation Patrick, M. E., Schulenberg, J. E., Miech, R. A., Johnston, L. D., O’Malley, P. M., & Bachman, J. G. (2022). Monitoring the Future Panel Study annual report: National data on substance use among adults ages 19 to 60, 1976-2021. Monitoring the Future Monograph Series. University of Michigan Institute for Social Research: Ann Arbor, MI. doi:10.7826/ISRUM.06.585140.002.07.0001.2022
Chapter 1
Monitoring the Future Panel Study Design
Overview
Monitoring the Future (MTF) is an ongoing research program conducted at the University of Michigan’s Institute for Social Research under a series of investigator-initiated, competing research grants from the National Institute on Drug Abuse beginning in 1975. The integrated MTF study includes annual surveys of nationally representative samples of 8th, 10th, and 12th grade students, as well as a subset of 12th grade students followed into adulthood from each graduating class. Repeating these annual cross-sectional surveys over time provides data to examine behavior change across history in consistent age segments of the adult population, as well as among key subgroups.
The panel study now has over 108,000 individuals, with approximately 28,500 surveyed each year including young adults ages 19 to 30 and adults ages 35 to 60. These data, gathered on national samples over such a large portion the lifespan, are extremely rare and can provide needed insight into the epidemiology, etiology, and life course history of substance use and relevant behaviors, attitudes, and other factors. The current report is the latest in a series of publications dating back to 1986 and updated annually since then, all available at monitoringthefuture.org.
Participants
Young Adults (Ages 19 to 30)
In 2021, young adults (N=4,909) were from the 12th grade classes of 2009 to 2020 and provided data at modal ages 19 to 30 (see Table 1). Each individual participates in a young adult follow up survey every two years. However, because each cohort’s follow up sample is split into two random subsamples that are surveyed in alternate years (at ages 19/20, 21/22, 23/24, 25/26, 27/28, 29/30), a representative sample of people from each 12th grade class is obtained every year.
Adults (Ages 35 to 60)
In 2021, adults ages 35 to 60 (N=5,636) were from the 12th grade classes of 2004, 1999, 1994, 1989, 1984, and 1979 and provided data at modal ages 35, 40, 45, 50, 55, and 60, respectively (see Table 1). In the analyses in this report, combined prevalence estimates for adults ages 35 to 50 are reported.
Research Design & Procedures: Base Year
The MTF panel first samples participants in 12th grade, which corresponds to modal age 18. The methods and findings regarding this base year survey are available elsewhere. Briefly, 12th graders have been surveyed in the spring of each year since 1975. Typically, each year’s data collection of 12th graders takes place in 120–140 public and private high schools selected to provide an accurate representative cross-section of 12th graders throughout the contiguous United States. In 2020, due to the school shutdowns that came with the COVID-19 pandemic in March 2020, only 36 schools participated in data collection for 12th graders. Analyses of the 2020 12th grade data indicated that the curtailed sample did not differ from the Monitoring the Future Panel Study Design 3 nationally representative results from previous years in terms of socio-demographic characteristics.1
The final year of high school, 12th grade, is a strategic starting point at which to begin longitudinal panel surveys to monitor drug use and related attitudes of youth through adulthood. Completion of high school represents the end of an important developmental period in the United States, demarcating both the end of universal education and, for many, the end of living full time in the parental home. Therefore, it provides an important base year from which to follow individuals as they transition to adulthood. There is also a practical advantage: it is the final point at which a reasonably good national sample of an age-specific cohort can be drawn from schools. However, a limitation of the MTF study design is the exclusion of individuals who dropped out of high school before graduation—approximately 5–15% of each age cohort nationally. The dropout rate has been declining in recent years; it was 5% in 2020, according to U.S. Census statistics.2 Because the proportion of students who drop out is small and remains relatively constant from year to year, drop out omission should introduce little or no bias in analyses of trends.
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Source : monitoring the future
Link to original article: MFT Panel Report 2022
