Some of these factors were also supported in previous research examining parental perceptions and beliefs of marijuana use and discussions with their children , and now could extend to include unhealthy eating discussions as well. By addressing these constructs, we were able to propose an adapted theoretical model that could possibly decrease unhealthy eating and marijuana use in children and adolescents. According to descriptive analyses, a good proportion of parents had trouble engaging in discussions with their children centered on unhealthy eating and marijuana use . As a result, this project further proposed and developed three parenting framed messages aimed at promoting parent and child discussion of the health risk behaviors . The authoritative parenting-framed message was rated as most effective in motivating discussions about unhealthy eating and marijuana use compared to authoritarian parenting-framed message and permissive parenting-framed message. Relatedly, several studies have found that authoritative parenting styles are associated with decreased health risk behaviors in adolescents, including lower use of alcohol, tobacco, and illicit drugs . These conclusions were utilized to develop discussion tools that included the authoritatively-framed message, in order to further motivate effective discussions about unhealthy eating and marijuana use between parents and their children . It is believed that parents who struggle to have these discussions might benefit from tools on how to have these conversations with their children.The study findings partially supported the moderating effects of parenting styles on discussion tools and some of the cognitive factors. Future studies could target the implementation of additional discussion tools, aside from unhealthy eating and marijuana use discussion tools.

This could gather information on ways to improve the utility of the authoritative parenting-framed message within the context of the discussion tool by closely examining the effects on several health-risk behaviors. It could be that some behaviors respond better to the authoritative parenting component compared to others. Although, vertical air solutions these tools were still effective in motivating discussions, and so, the discussion tools could be modified and tested in a bigger sample.Limitations of the present research project requires consideration when interpreting the results and point to directions for future research. Initially, the results may not be representative of all parents across the nation or in other countries, as Study 1 and 3 consisted predominantly of Non-Hispanic White and well-educated participants, whereas Study 2 consisted of participants between the ages of 18 to 20 years old. More research is needed to measure the practicality of the discussion tools with more ethnically diverse groups. With regards to marijuana use, utilizing random samples of parents in the United States could prove to be beneficial in interpreting results, as the landscape is constantly changing with regards to marijuana legalization laws, and could impact discussion of marijuana use between parents and their children. Another important limitation to consider is the lack of fathers within the samples. Fathers may have differing responses to the discussion tools compared to mothers. As noted by the participant characteristics , the parents were primarily mothers of children ages 10 to 17 years old and 80% of responses by children were about their mothers . It warrants the need to investigate the impact of perceived parenting styles of fathers on motivating discussion of unhealthy eating and marijuana use. The comparability of responses across mothers and fathers could lead to the incorporation of richer parenting practices to consider when designing future discussion tools. Moreover, all three studies relied on self-report on specific questions, which may lead to bias of participant responses.

The partial support of the moderating effects of parenting styles indicates the need for further investigation of how these practices could influence discussion outcomes, and copiously recognize the implications in promoting future discussions about unhealthy eating and marijuana use. Additional studies of parents of children in younger age groups , and children of younger age groups are needed. This could provide more information on what elements are most effective when designing discussion tools for varying child age groups, and if differences exist. The present research project provided preliminary findings to consider on the moderating effects of authoritative, authoritarian, and permissive parenting styles, and could be expanded to include additional traits and temperaments specific to parents and children. It may be beneficial to measure more acceptability items after participants view the discussion tools, by including more items than perceived effectiveness, perceived interpretability, motivations to address the behavior after the discussion tools, in order to provide additional ways of testing the effectiveness of the tools. This could possibly elicit richer qualitative data onthe differing effects of the discussion tools on parents and their children. By identifying key words and phrases that were utilized in their discussions, it could lead to the consideration of other parent-child practices or characteristics that could influence the discussions of these behaviors.To conclude, the present research project explored the associations of a revised theoretical framework of parenting styles and PWM factors on parent motivations to discuss unhealthy eating and marijuana use with their child , tested the acceptability of authoritative parenting-framed messages of unhealthy eating and marijuana use by youth , and then, designed and developed discussion tools to encourage parent conversations about unhealthy eating and marijuana use with their child . This study contributes new data, in a sample of American parents with children between the ages of 10 to 17 years old, on the moderating effects of the discussion tools about unhealthy eating and marijuana use in parent-child discussions about these behaviors. The partial support of the moderating effects of parenting styles validates the need for further exploration of how these qualities could impact discussion outcomes of health risk behaviors.

Subsequent research should be directed at a longitudinal, nationwide study on whether parental motivations to discuss unhealthy eating and marijuana with their children could extend to random samples of parents in the United States and elsewhere. Additional studies could also include other risky behaviors in order to test whether authoritatively-framed discussion tools extend to other behaviors as well.Marijuana is the most widely used illicit substance worldwide . In 2010, more US high school students used marijuana in the prior 30 days than tobacco . Co-use with tobacco is of increasing interest . Smoking marijuana with tobacco, either in a tobacco leaf or mixed with tobacco, is an increasingly common practice among adolescents thought by some users to prolong the effects and/or increase the high from marijuana . A recent national online, anonymous survey of young smokers reported that roughly half also smoked marijuana in the past 30 days . Co-use of marijuana and tobacco may contribute to the development of nicotine dependence and thus, is an important area of research for the investigation. Adult co-users of tobacco and marijuana have an increased risk of developing nicotine dependence and have worse tobacco cessation outcomes . While overall rates of tobacco use and co-use with marijuana are lower in adolescents compared with adults , most addicted adults develop nicotine dependence during adolescence. Therefore, vertical weed grow adolescence is a critical period to study the effects of marijuana on tobacco.Although the transition from experimentation with tobacco to addiction is likely multifactorial, marijuana use may play a role for some adolescents and has been identified as a risk for nicotine addiction in a study of young adults . Possible mechanisms of action include common routes of administration ; hence, one behavior may reinforce the other. Furthermore, both nicotine and cannabis affect similar pathways within the mesolimbic addiction pathways, suggesting similar and overlapping mechanisms for addiction . Finally, smoking cues are also similar between the two substances, which may contribute to the poorer tobacco cessation outcomes observed in adult co-users of marijuana . Despite the increasing prevalence of marijuana use in adolescents, particularly among smokers, and evidence of harm from marijuana-tobacco co-use in adults, little is known about the interaction between marijuana and tobacco in adolescents. The goal of this study was to examine the severity of nicotine addiction among teen smokers as a function of co-occurring marijuana use. Given the literature on adult smokers, we hypothesized marijuana would contribute to symptoms of nicotine dependence among adolescents.Adolescents between the ages of 13-17 from the San Francisco Bay Area who smoked at least 1 cigarette in the past 30 days were recruited as part of an ongoing smoking trajectory study detailed elsewhere . Adolescents responding to online, school and clinic based advertising were invited to complete the study visit. Females with positive pregnancy tests were excluded from the study.Adolescent tobacco smokers completed in-person surveys of smoking behaviors and dependence scales. Tobacco use was measured by asking adolescents how many cigarettes they smoked on each day of the week. Participants who reported smoking on fewer than 30 of the previous 30 days were considered intermittent smokers .

Given the lack of consensus regarding optimal measurement of nicotine dependence in adolescents, the study administered the following four measures at study entry: the modified Fagerström Tolerance Questionnaire , the Hooked on Nicotine Checklist , the Nicotine Dependence Syndrome Scale , and the International statistical classification of diseases and related health problems, 10th revision criteria for nicotine dependence . All of the nicotinedependence measures were scored continuously with the total score on each measure used to quantify nicotine addiction.Frequency of marijuana use was categorized as: 1) never or no use in past 3 months, 2) Once a month or less plus once a week or less, 3) one or more times a week, and 4) every day. Spearman’s rho correlations examined associations between frequency of our ordinal measure of marijuana use with demographic variables, cigarettes per day and alcohol use. To examine the association between marijuana and measures of nicotine addiction , we ran general linear models with key variables that in the literature have been associated with nicotine addiction and marijuana use .Two hundred adolescents were consented into the study and completed the baseline visit. Of those, 28 denied smoking cigarettes in the past 30 days and 7 declined to answer the question about marijuana use and were thus excluded from the analysis. The resulting sample had a mean age of 16.1 years and was racially diverse, with 28% participants identifying as White, 19% African American, 19% Hispanic and 34% other. Participants averaged 3.01 CPD for a duration of 1.98 years . Fifty-one participants reported daily cigarette smoking and 111 reported non-daily smoking . Mean scores were 2.56 on the mFTQ , 4.52 on the HONC , -1.75 on the NDSS , and 10.13 on the ICD-10 . Most participants reported marijuana use in the past 30 days with 43 using weekly, and 62 reporting daily use. Frequency of marijuana use was correlated with CPD , but not with the frequency of alcohol use . Participant CESD scores were not associated with frequency of marijuana use or cigarette use . In general linear models controlling for age, years of smoking, and daily versus non-daily smoking, frequency of marijuana use was significantly and positively associated with nicotine addiction . The findings were consistent across all four measures of dependence and remained significant for the mFTQ after removing the question on CPD. When examining the NDSS subscales, only the drive and priority subscales were significantly associated with marijuana frequency. Older age, more years smoking, and daily smoking were associated with greater nicotine dependence in all models. The total percent of variance predicted ranged from 25% for the HONC to 44% for the mFTQ and NDSS. Illicit drug use may co-occur across substances, and follow-up analyses sought to examine whether the finding of an association with nicotine dependence was specific to marijuana. Therefore, we also assessed co-use with other illicit substances. In the past 3 months, 40 participants reported ecstasy use. A small number of participants reported use of cocaine/crack , methamphetamine , mushrooms/ mescaline , heroin , Percocet/Vicodin , or LSD , preventing inclusion in analyses. Ecstasy, included as a covariate in the fully adjusted general linear models, was not a significant contributor with p-values ranging from .24-.99 and the effects for marijuana remained largely unchanged.Marijuana smoking was prevalent in this adolescent sample of tobacco smokers: 80% reported past month marijuana use and more than a third smoked marijuana daily. Notably, among adolescent tobacco smokers who also smoked marijuana, the frequency of marijuana use was associated with greater levels of nicotine addiction on all three major scales used in studies with adolescents plus the ICD-10.