Rural Pregnant Cocaine Users: An in-Depth Sociodemographic Comparison

Abstract

As part of a prospective, longitudinal study of the effects of prenatal cocaine use on infant outcome, we enrolled 308 women when they first came in for prenatal care or at delivery, in the case of no prenatal care. The 154 women in the cocaine use group, identified by means of drug history and urine testing, were matched to 154 non-cocaine using controls on race, parity, socioeconomic status, and level of prenatal risk. This report presents a summary of the demographic and drug-use information collected at the time of delivery and the psychosocial data measured at delivery including standardized measures of depression, locus of control, self-esteem, concepts of development, life stress, and social support. Between group comparisons revealed that cocaine users were more likely than non-users to be older, to use other drugs, to begin their drug use at an earlier age, to have more depressive symptoms, to have an external locus of control, to have lower self-esteem, to have a more simplistic understanding of child development, and to have higher positive life event impact scores.