Quitting smoking is one of the healthiest things a person can do, but it’s also among the hardest, especially for teenage smokers who battle not only addiction but also the social pressure to keep lighting up.
adolescents
The Half-Baked Teen Brain: A Hazard or a Virtue?
Teenagers have a bad reputation. They’re moody, they thrive on drama. They take risks that terrify their parents and seem blithely unaware of the potential consequences of their actions. The reason for this, as scientists have …
Hollywood to Kids: Smoking Isn’t Cool
Were they still alive today, John Wayne and Humphrey Bogart might have been given a serious image makeover. The message from Hollywood last year: smoking in movies is not cool anymore.
Study: Internet Use, but Not TV Watching, Linked to Sleeplessness in Teens
Many studies (along with casual observation in any home with a teenager) have associated nighttime media use — video gaming, Internet surfing and TV time — with sleep deficits in teens. But the latest research fine tunes …
Gay-Friendly Communities Are Good for Straight Teens Too
A spate of suicides involving gay teens last fall reignited concern among youth activists and health experts over the disproportionately high rate of suicide among gay American teens. Now, a survey of high-school students in …
5 Ways Parents May Be Sabotaging Their Kids’ Health
In a recent survey sponsored by the YMCA, 9 out of 10 parents rated themselves as good or excellent at providing a healthy home environment. But there’s something amiss: while 89% of parents think they are providing the right …
Increasingly, Internet Activism Helps Shutter Abusive ‘Troubled Teen’ Boot Camps
For the last 40 years, teens with drug problems, learning disabilities and other behavioral issues have been sent to residential facilities to endure “tough love” techniques that are widely known to include methods of outright …
Will the FDA Ban Menthol Cigarettes?
The Food and Drug Administration’s (FDA) Tobacco Products Scientific Advisory Committee is due in the coming week to submit to the agency its final report on the health effects of menthol cigarettes. The FDA is considering a ban …
How to Find the Best Drug Treatment for Teens: A Guide for Parents
Getting your child treatment for, say, cancer presents numerous challenges — but most of them don’t involve determining whether the therapies offered by major medical organizations are backed by data. Unfortunately, that’s …
Trick or Treat? Oregon Couple Handed Out Condoms to Mixed Reviews
Kathleen and Daniel Harris of Silverton, Ore., had a surprise for some trick-or-treaters this Halloween: prophylactics and a stern talking-to about safe sex.
What Goes on Inside the Brain of a Misbehaving Boy?
When it comes to raising civilized kids there are no hard rules, but there are two things on which most parents agree: Boys are generally wilder than girls, and adolescents are wilder than kids of any other age.
Why White Girls Are Getting More Weight Loss Surgery
Researchers at the University of California, Los Angeles, found that the rate of weight loss surgery in the U.S., including lap band and gastric bypass, went up by 700% between 2005 and 2007. But we already knew that the …
Lack of Sleep Linked With Depression, Weight Gain and Even Death
A collection of studies published Wednesday in the journal Sleep tackled some important questions: What are the health effects of not getting enough sleep? How does sleep deprivation affect teens? Does insomnia have long-term consequences?
