INFLUENCE OF PEER PRESSURE AND HOME BACKGROUND ON ADOLESCENTS CONSUMPTION OF DRUGS IN NASARAWA METROPOLIS, NASARAWA STATE

The study adopted descriptive suing research design. The population of the study consists of7 843 seconday schools. Stratified random sampling technique mas used to select 200 stratified random sampling techniques from the four senior secondary schools in Nasarawa Metropolis, Nasarawa State. The instalment used for data gathering was “Influence of Peer Pressure and Home Background on Adolescents' Consumption of Dmgs Questionnaire" (IPPHBACDO). The researchers established logical validity index of 0.81 and 0.81 for IPPHBACDO and reliability index of 0.77 through Cron bach Alpha method to compute coefficient of internal consistency. The mean and standard deviation was used to answer the research questions while chi-square was used to test the hypotheses at 0.05 level of significance. The finding of the study revealed that peer pressure influenced adolescent's consumption of dmgs; peer pressure and home background influenced adolescent's consumption of drugs also indicates that adolescent's who do not have a strong relationship with their parents, would have to resort peers as the main source of support. Based on thesef indings, the study recommended that trained counselor should be posted to all the seconday schools so as to help counsel adolescents with negative influences and that parents as a matter of importance should ensure that then should be healthy parent—child attachment, functional family structure, appropriate parental monitoring authoritative parenting style and communications of pro—social values by family members in order to prevent the adolescents from negative influences.