A Case Study of Inhalant Use and Age of Drug Use Onset in Conjunction with Gateway Hypothesis

The Gateway Hypothesis in drug use suggests a progressive and hierarchical sequence of stages of drug use that starts with legal drugs such as alcohol and tobacco, proceeds to marijuana, and then starts other illicit drugs such as cocaine and heroine. Whether inhalants, the 4th most popular drugs misused by U.S. population, are one of Gateway drugs has been less documented. Our study analyzed the 2003 National Survey on Drug Use and Health data to explore those who were aged 12 and older (n=55230) about their age of inhalant onset and the association with the use of other drugs. The goal is to examine potential evidence of inhalants as a possible gateway drug. Key findings include that among those who ever used inhalants (n=6833), 95% co-used other drugs including alcohol, tobacco, and any other illicit drugs. Of this 95% population, 80% did not use inhalants first. However, among those who only used inhalants and illicit drugs without alcohol and tobacco, 50% started inhalants earlier and 17% started inhalants at the same age as illicit drug use. Logistics regression tests indicated that when inhalant use first as a reference category used alcohol, tobacco, or illicit drugs earlier increased odds to be current drug users, adjusting for demographic variables. Factor analysis was also conducted in studying the age of drug onset variances. To use cross-sectional data to reveal historical changes in drug use is overly simplistic. Further research needs on this issue will be discussed.