What Are Risk and Protective Factors?
Risk factors increase the vulnerability of an individual, a group, or a community to substance abuse disorders or untreated mental health problems. Biology and heredity are among those risk factors for mental disorders; for example, children of parents with depression or schizophrenia are at greater risk for the disease, possibly due to a genetic predisposition. Similarly, the greater the number of drug abuse risk factors, the greater the risk for drug abuse. Additional risk factors might include a history of violence and or trauma, poverty, school problems, out of home placement, depression, and or suicide attempts. Although no one risk factor is disorder specific, multiple risk factors are often related to more negative outcomes such as mental disorders. Protective factors build resiliency in the same individual, group, or community and increase the likelihood that substance abuse and its related effects can be resisted. These may include a positive self-esteem, an outgoing personali
