Teen Marijuana Vaping Soars, Displacing Other Habits

On the flip side, she said, when it comes to vaping, young people may have gotten the wrong message: that it is not harmful. Silvia Martins, an associate professor of epidemiology at the Columbia University Mailman School of Public Health, noted that marijuana is increasingly marketed in states where it is legal to suggest the drug may have widespread health benefits, claims that are not backed up by science. The rise of marijuana vaping among young people, she said, “could be related to the fact it is seen as less harmful and less risky.”

More broadly, Dr. Martins and other experts said that the changes in teenage drug use may have a curious influence: technology.

The rise in vaping, they said, stems partly from the allure of the sleek electronic devices that deliver nicotine and marijuana, glamorized on social media and streaming videos; the gadgets are also relatively easy to conceal because they are designed to reduce smell and smoke. The popular Juul device, for instance, is often referred to as the iPhone of e-cigarettes.

“One of the reasons they are embracing these devices is because they are new technology. It resonates,” said Dr. Volkow of NIDA, the federal drug abuse institute.

But technology may also be partly responsible for the decline in the use of some other drugs, Dr. Martins and Dr. Volkow, among others, have hypothesized. The theory is that some teenagers are partying less because they are spending time stimulated by their devices, and communicating with one another over social media, rather than in gatherings where they might have encountered alcohol or drugs. Dr. Martins is in the middle of research to test that hypothesis.

Now Dr. Volkow said she hopes that teenagers will awaken to the fact that using marijuana regularly can be dangerous. “Less and less do kids feel it is harmful to smoke marijuana regularly,” she said, adding that she regrets that these teens are being misled by what she called “the freedom of misinformation.”

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