DOI: 10.3886/icpsr39172.v1
title: Monitoring the Future: A Continuing Study of American Youth (12th-Grade Survey), 2023
title: Version 1

description: This survey of 12th-grade students is part of a series that explores changes in important values, behaviors, and lifestyle orientations of contemporary American youth. Students are randomly assigned to complete one of six questionnaires, each with a different subset of topical questions, but all containing a set of "core" questions on demographics and substance use. There are about 1,400 variables across the questionnaires. Substance use covered by this survey includes: tobacco, smokeless tobacco, alcohol, marijuana, hashish, vaping, prescription medications, over-the-counter medications, LSD, hallucinogens, amphetamines (stimulants), Ritalin (methylphenidate), sedatives/barbiturates (tranquilizers), cocaine, crack cocaine, GHB (gamma hydroxy butyrate), ecstasy, methamphetamine, and heroin. Other topics include attitudes toward religion, changing roles for women, educational aspirations, self-esteem, exposure to drug education, and violence and crime (both in and out of school).
Highlights for 2023:

12th grade only: Continuation of randomized blocks of questions presented to
students. Please see Appendix D of the codebook.
All grades: Change to the question stem for some lifetime, 12 month, and 30 day marijuana use questions.Separate codebooks are generated by ICPSR for the core data file (DS1) and the six form-specific data files (DS2-DS7). The codebooks contain only the frequencies, question text, and response options for the survey items. Please see the documentation under DS0 Study-Level Files for the annual study documentation provided by MTF, 39172-0001-User_guide-UsersGuide.pdf.

Please see the Highlights for 2023 section in the codebook for more details.
Additional information is documented in the MTFQchanges2023byForm.pdf
and MTFQchanges2023byType.pdf files available for download.
description: A total of 7,584 students completed a survey in 2023. The number of students completing each form were:

Form 1: 1,256
Form 2: 1,274
Form 3: 1,264
Form 4: 1,258
Form 5: 1,281
Form 6: 1,251

In 2023, MTF continued the web-based survey administration. Depending on the school, surveys were completed in-person, remotely, or a combination of modes, and MTF survey proctors were permitted in the classrooms.
description: There are about 1,400 variables across the questionnaires. On average, each form consisted of 400 questions. Some questions were repeated on multiple forms and some were asked on all six forms. All of the survey questions are categorical in nature. The majority of questions fall into one of seven types of response options.

Yes / No
Marked / Not Marked
Agree / Disagree scale (5 point)
Disapproval scale (3 point)
Risk scale (4 point)
Frequency of days (6 point)
Frequency of use (7 point)

The Core Data file (DS1) is a compilation across all six survey forms of the substance use and demographics questions of the surveys - the questions common to all forms - plus additional substance use variables of interest that may not be on all forms (e.g. vaping-related variables). Please see the codebook for a detailed list of the substance use variables included in DS1.
description: Each of the seven parts contains a weight variable, <strong>ARCHIVE_WT</strong>. The weights were originally varied by school but were modified to protect respondent confidentiality. Users should use the weight variable for all analyses, the results of which will differ slightly from published data tables that used original data.
<strong>OF SPECIAL NOTE:</strong> As the MTF respondents are sampled using a multi-stage sampling design, it is often desirable to incorporate the complex sample design information into analyses. However, in order to protect respondent confidentiality, the variables that represent the complex sample design of the MTF, i.e., sampling stratum and cluster, are omitted from the public use files. For researchers who wish to incorporate the unaltered weight variable and complex sample design variables into their analyses, these variables are now accessible through restricted access from NAHDAP. Please see Monitoring the Future (MTF) Restricted-Use Cross-Sectional Datasets for details.
description: Response Rates: The overall student response rate for 2023 was 72 percent.
description: A multistage area probability sample design was used involving three selection stages: (1) geographic areas or primary sampling units (PSUs), (2) schools (or linked groups of schools) within PSUs, and (3) students within sampled schools. Of the 72 PSUs, 8 were selected with certainty, 10 were selected with a probability of .50, and the remainder were selected using a probability based on their 2010 Census household count. Generally speaking, in schools with more than 350 seniors, a sample of seniors or classes was drawn.
In schools with less than 350 seniors, all seniors were asked to participate unless logistical challenges required a sample be taken. Each school was asked to participate for two years so that each year one-half of the sample would be replaced. Schools declining participation were replaced with similar schools in terms of geographic location, size, and type of school (e.g., public, private/Catholic, private/non-Catholic). The participation rate among schools has been between 66 and 85 percent since the inception of the study. The total sample of 12th graders was divided into 6 subsamples, each to be administered a different form of the questionnaire. "Core" substance use and demographic questions were included in all questionnaire forms.
description: Datasets: 
DS0: Study-Level Files
DS1: Core Data
DS2: Form 1 Data
DS3: Form 2 Data
DS4: Form 3 Data
DS5: Form 4 Data
DS6: Form 5 Data
DS7: Form 6 Data
description: High school seniors in the contiguous United States. Smallest Geographic Unit: Census Region
description: web-based surveyThis study was conducted by the Survey Research Center, Institute for Social Research at the University of Michigan.To protect the anonymity of respondents, all variables that could be used to identify individuals have been collapsed or recoded in the public use files. These modifications should not affect analytic uses of the public use files.Variables omitted from the Western region questionnaires are noted in the codebook.A cross-time question index is included with the available documentation for the MTF 12th-grade data. The document is sorted by subject area and covers the time period 1976 to 2023.Frequency and percentage distributions displayed in the 2023 codebook are unweighted, rather than weighted as they had been in previous years. This change was made to simplify both the production of the codebook and their interpretation by the analyst.As referenced in the UsersGuide two PDF documents have been included for download to help provide additional context and understanding to data users. These documents provided by the Principal Investigators detail changes in 2023 to the questionnaires. One document is organized by form. The other document is organized by change (dropped items, added items, changes to response categories, and changes to the text of the question). Each document covers changes for both the 8th/10th grade and 12th grade data. Therefore, the exact same documents are available for download with the 8th/10th grade data (ICPSR 39171).MTF does not release detailed geography codes in its public use files because of the disclosure risk it would cause. The MTF sample is drawn to generate representative samples of the four Census Bureau regions of the country (Northeast, Midwest, South, and West), but it does not generate representative samples of smaller geographic areas such as states, counties, or cities. For additional information about data that are withheld from the public use files, please see the study codebook.The MTF Principal Investigators created a series of dichotomous recodes for 10 substances for the three standard time periods (lifetime, past 12 months, and past 30 days). The substances include tobacco, alcohol, marijuana, LSD, other psychedelics, amphetamines, sedatives/barbiturates, tranquilizers, inhalants, and other narcotics. These variables have been placed at the end of the Core data file (DS1). Each variable has the same name and label as the original, but with the addition of the letter "D" at the end of the variable name and the words "(dichotomous recode)" included at the end of the variable label. This was only done for the core file.For further information about Monitoring the Future please visit their web site. The site provides links to more publications, press releases, and data findings.