What is the ATS?The American Tobacco Survey (ATS) provides in-depth information on tobacco use rates and the attitudes about tobacco held by young people in your community. This information can help you assess community needs and evaluate existing prevention programs, provide the data required to write grant proposals, and serve as a resource for local public policy decision-makers.
The ATS consists of 32 questions about tobacco use and attitudes. The ATS can be given to students in 4-12th grades and takes them about 10 to 15 minutes to complete. Many students want to give both the American Drug and Alcohol Survey (ADAS) and the ATS to students. This is highly recommended when you want information about a variety of substances. The two surveys will usually take students about 30 to 45 minutes to complete. Procedures are used that carefully protect the students’ anonymity.
The surveys are then returned to R.M.B.S.I. where they are scanned in to our computer and analyzed. We prepare reports on the results for the group of students. No individual results are ever provided. You will receive your reports approximately 30 days after we receive the completed surveys.
The ATS is available in two formats:
- a single-sheet survey, which may be used with students in 4th through 12th grades, or
- an 8-page booklet combined with the Adolescent version of the ADAS, which may be used with 6-12th graders
The single-sheet survey is ideal for communities that want to:
- Collect data on tobacco issues from 4-5th grade students (with or without using the Children’s ADAS).
- Collect data from any grade level focusing only on tobacco issues, or
- Create a comprehensive data picture regarding use of alcohol, tobacco and other drugs, as well as risk and protective factors for drug use and violence. If this is your goal, we recommend using the ADAS/PPS booklets for 6-12th graders in one class session, and the ATS by itself in a separate class session
The ATS report includes 17 tables and is approximately 24 pages long. With each ATS report we provide a presentation script and a set of overhead transparencies, so that you can easily give presentations of the survey results.
© 2003 Rocky Mountain Behavioral Science Institute.