Transcript Ch10_LPPT - Napa Valley College

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Chapter 10:
Drug and Alcohol Abuse
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History of Drug Abuse
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Drug use not new to human race
Drugs:
• Substances that have psychological or physical effects
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Intentional fermentation
• Process used to make alcohol
 Dates back to Stone Age
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Narcotics
• Drugs considered illegal today
 Also date back thousands of years
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Drug Use in Ancient Times
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Citizens of Sumer
• First true civilization
• Used opium for medical and recreational purposes as
early as 3000 B.C.E
 Referred to the substance as “Gil Hul” or “joy plant”
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Torah describe early origins of winemaking in
Middle East
Ebers Papyrus
• Medical document from ancient Egypt
• Outlines the many medicinal uses of opium
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Drug Use in the 18th Century
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Opium also one of first drugs to be abused
for recreational purposes
Opium addiction became a serious social
problem in China during the 18th century
• Emperor outlawed cultivation, sale, and use of
drug
• Laws failed to impede trafficking or abuse
• Still legal in Western Europe
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Making something illegal and attempting
to punish it out of existence doesn’t work
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Early Drug Use in the United States
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During Civil War
• Opium and its derivative morphine regularly
given to soldiers
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Dependence lasted long after wounds
healed
• Addiction became known as “army disease”
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1898, Bayer known for producing aspirin
• Developed heroin
• Marketed as non-addictive substitute for
morphine
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Continued
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Early 1900s
• Harmful and addictive drugs readily available
• Coca-Cola contained cocaine until 1906
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Temperance movements for alcohol and drugs
began to arise
• Harrison Narcotic Act of 1914
 First federal law to restrict sale, manufacturing, and
distribution of drugs
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Host of laws to restrict, control, and punish drug
abuse and alcoholism on the books
• Social problem of addiction continues
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Drug Use and Abuse
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Drug Use
• The act of internally processing chemical substances
other than food that have physical effects
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Drug Abuse
• The use of drugs despite adverse consequences
 Adverse consequences typically associated with
street drugs such as cocaine or heroin
• Seemingly harmless drugs can also damage person’s
health when used frequently and in large quantities
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Addiction
• A chronic condition that can include psychological
and/or physiological compulsion toward drug seeking
and use
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Types of Drugs
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Person’s reaction to a drug depends on
type of drug being used
Stimulants
• Excite the body and stimulate the brain and
central nervous system
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Depressants
• Slow activity of vital organs in body to create
relaxed, sleepy feeling
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Hallucinogens
• Distort the senses and cause hallucinations
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Copyright © 2011 Pearson Education, Inc., Upper Saddle River, NJ 07458. All rights reserved.
Basics of Drug Use in America
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Characteristics of Drug Users
• Age
 2007 survey
• 42% of Americans over 26 have used marijuana
• Only about 16% of young adults have tried it
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1999, estimated more than half of high
school seniors used illicit drugs
one fourth of eight graders admitted to
having been drunk at least once
44% reported they smoked cigarettes
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Continued
• Race
 Drug abuse occurs among all races in United States
 More prevalent in some races than others
• Socioeconomic Status
 Studies show connection:
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Between illegal drug use and dropping out of school
Lower educational attainment
Unemployment
Low rates of advancement in one’s career
Research suggests lower incomes for drug users
takes time to manifest
• Effect of drug use has little impact on individual when
younger, but increases over time
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Prescription Drug Use
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Americans finding new ways to get high
• Current trend is misuse of prescription drugs
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Centers for Disease Control and
Prevention
• More than 1.8 billion prescription drugs
ordered or provided in 2006
• Most frequent prescribed being analgesics, or
painkillers
• Abused rather than used appropriately
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Continued
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Three types of prescription drugs most
commonly abused:
• Opiates
• Central nervous system depressants
• Stimulants
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Amphetamines, such as Adderall or
Ritalin, some of most widely abused
prescription drugs among teens
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Why Do We Use Drugs?
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People have always used drugs and will
likely continue to use them
Most of society’s legal efforts to control
drug use fail
• Issue becomes how to control use while
avoiding harmful aspects of drug abuse
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Causes of drug abuse are difficult to
determine
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Continued
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Many people do not agree addiction is a
sign of moral or psychological weakness
Treating addiction as a medical condition:
• Arose in 20th century and resulted in number
of treatment programs and models
• Models hold two common beliefs:
 (1) Individuals have biological
predispositions to addiction
 (2) These predispositions can be overcome
through treatment
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Socialization
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Researcher Denise Kandel
• There is interaction between how person
socialized and with whom they interact
• We are socialized by a variety of individuals
 Parents
 Peers provide more powerful socialization
• Selection of one’s peer group provides foundation
for likelihood of use by adolescents
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Continued
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Another part of drug socialization
• United States is increasingly becoming a medicalized
society
• Medicalization
 The process by which we expand use of medical
terms and solutions to non-medical problems
 Medical personnel claim certain social components
are diseases in need of treatment
 Increases the public’s desire for medical solutions
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Social problems of substance abuse are not just
individual issues
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Continued
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Continued
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Symbolic Interactionism
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It’s not the effects of a drug, but how we
perceive the drug that affects our opinions
Social acceptability of a drug is linked to
how society defines
We see the alcoholic differently than we
see the “pothead,” usually because they
come from different social classes
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Functionalism
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Drugs have manifest and latent functions in
society
Functionalists believe most drugs have positive
and negative potential and must be controlled
Job of social structures is to support proper use,
but not the abuse, of such drugs
Efforts to educate public against illegal drug use
are efforts to control use
• Often have the opposite effects
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Continued
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Sociologist Robert Merton
• Drug use is result of an individual reaction to social
forces
• Theory of anomie
 Some individuals blocked from attaining certain
societal goals and fail to achieve them
• Cultural norm of successful life not available to them
• Person may choose to adapt through Retreatism
 Response of person who has given up trying to
achieve goals of society because they believe the
means to those goals have no merit
 May retreat into addictive patterns of drug and
alcohol use
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Conflict Theory
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In a perfect legal system, all criminals would be
treated equally
Underprivileged minorities more likely to be
arrested for drug use and given harsher
sentences than middle-class whites
Despite fact that blacks and whites engage in
possession and sale of drugs at similar rates
• Blacks arrested on drug charges at 2.8 to 5.5 times rate
of whites
• Trend likely due to more frequent police patrols in
different neighborhoods
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Continued
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Arrests involve possession of crack cocaine
• Focus of the “war on drugs” for past decade
• Sentencing tends to be harsher than on individuals who
are found with powdered cocaine
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Criminologists Jeffrey Reiman
• Race and ethnicity have something to do with
discrepancy
 Large amounts of minority drug abusers use crack
(90.2% of African American and Hispanic abusers,
compared to 8.8% of white abusers)
 White addicts prefer snorting powdered cocaine
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Treatment or Punishment?
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Drug abuse is a legal issue and social issue
• Some promote jail time
• Others suggest rehabilitation
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Alcoholics Anonymous (AA)
• One of oldest and most well-known substance treatment
programs in United States
• Formed in 1930s by Bill W.
 Last names never used to maintain members’
anonymity
• Twelve-Step Program
 Outlines steps person must take to fully understand
addiction and move to a life of sobriety
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Continued
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Narcotics Anonymous
• Follows AA design
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Effective methods have variety of components
that include notion that no single type of
treatment works for everyone
Most successful ones include individual plans
designed to meet needs using variety of methods
• Counseling and behavioral modification vitally important
components
• So is medically supervised detoxification
• Inpatient or outpatient
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Continued
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In United States
• Largest category of criminal behavior for which
people are incarcerated related to drugs
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Incarceration boom of 1980s and 1990s
• Fueled by war on drugs
• Increased penalties for drug offenders
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Common for prisons to provide inmates
with drug and alcohol treatment
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Continued
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Treatment in community and/or prison is
effective
• Can treatment prevent incarceration?
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Center for Substance Abuse
• Average savings of three to one resulted in:
 Reduced crime
 Increased earnings from productive
individuals
 Lower health care costs
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Social and Financial Benefits
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The National Treatment Improvement Evaluation
Study
• Individuals served by federally funded treatment
programs
 Reduced drug use by nearly 50% within a year after
completing treatment
 Use of primary drug declined from 73% to 38% in
same time period
 Addicts’ quality of life improved by 53%
 Alcohol- and drug-related medical visits declined
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Continued
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Substance abuse treatment programs help
improve quality of life for everyone in society
Drug sales decreased by 78% in areas that
provided adequate drug treatment programs
Assaults decreased by 78%
Shoplifting declined by nearly 82%
Trends associated with 48% decline in individuals
who supported themselves through illegal activity
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Continued
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Drug treatment programs not only make
neighborhoods safer, but save residents
money
RAND Corporation study
• For every dollar invested into a treatment
program, taxpayers save $7.56 in criminal
prevention costs
Copyright © 2011 Pearson Education, Inc., Upper Saddle River, NJ 07458. All rights reserved.
Copyright © 2011 Pearson Education, Inc., Upper Saddle River, NJ 07458. All rights reserved.
The War on Drugs and Asset Forfeiture
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“Drug dealer”
• An occupation we do not want to be financially
successful
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Most drug dealers are small-time and not wealthy
Asset Forfeiture
• Allows government to seize any item believed to have
been purchased with proceeds from illegal activities
• Any assets being used in illegal activity can be seized
immediately
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Continued
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Asset forfeiture is controversial
• Burden of proof rests on accused
• Individual must provide evidence that assets
not associated with illegal activity
• Practice deviates from civil rights standard of
“innocent until proven guilty”
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10-month national study
• Over three quarters of people required to
forfeit property never charged with a crime
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