More from the study
Other findings from the 25th annual Indiana Youth Survey:

• 17.7 percent of students in ninth grade reported using alcohol within the past month, along with 23.5 percent of 10th-grade students, 28.1 percent of 11th-grade students and 33.2 percent of 12th-grade students.

• 9.9 percent of students in ninth grade reported marijuana use in the past month, along with 14 percent of 10th-grade students, 16.6 percent of 11th-grade students and 18.8 percent of 12th-grade students.

• 13.5 percent of students in ninth grade reported that they had made a plan to attempt suicide, along with 12.9 percent of 10th-grade students, 12.3 percent of 11th-grade students and 10.8 percent of 12th-grade students.
Smoking is popular among Hoosier youth — just not in the form of tobacco cigarettes.

Fewer Indiana high school students are smoking tobacco products, Indiana University researchers found in the 25th annual Indiana Youth Survey. One in four 12th-graders, however, said that they had used an electronic vapor product, more commonly called an e-cigarette, in the month prior to taking the survey, according to a report released Wednesday.

“This new tobacco delivery system technology is being heavily used by our youth in Indiana, and we’ve really got to pay attention to that,” said Ruth Gassman, executive director of the Indiana Prevention Resource Center, which conducted the survey.

This year’s Indiana Youth Survey — formerly known as the annual Survey of Alcohol, Tobacco and Other Drug Use by Indiana Children and Adolescents — was the first to include a question about Indiana students’ use of e-cigarettes. The survey was distributed to 111,585 students in grades 6 through 12 at 324 public and private schools in Indiana.

The survey found that an average of 15 percent of youth between seventh and 12th grades said that they used vaping products at least once in the month before they took the survey. Only 11.5 percent of ninth- through 12th-graders in Indiana said that they used cigarettes in the month prior to taking the survey.
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