Substance Use and Abuse for Youths in Foster Care: Results From the Communities That Care Normative Database

This study uses the Communities That Care Normative database to examine the prevalence of drug and alcohol use and abuse among foster care youths in comparison to youths not living in a foster home setting. The foster youths were more likely to have used all of the examined illicit substances, and these differences generally remained after controlling for a number of demographic differences between the two groups. These negative differences appear to be amplified for females in foster care. The overall high-risk profile of foster youths makes them an especially important population for targeted prevention.