Correlations and causations: Academic performance and risky behaviors among adolescents

Youth are at the forefront of the future; however, many are engaging in risky behaviors such as drugs and alcohol [6]. As high as 19.9% of youth in the United States aged 14-15 have reported having at least one drink, creating a sense of normality around the issue. In order to find potential associations and causations between these risky behaviors and other factors such as mental health, financial issues, and social isolation, Cramér’s V statistic [2] and the Fast Causal Inference (FCI) algorithm [5], a causal AI algorithm, were employed. Through these methods, it was determined that physical and mental health problems and social isolation are the two most likely motivations for students to experiment with drugs. This research marks the initial steps and further research on this topic could further reveal underlying factors influencing youth actions.