Hypothesis", Journal of Health and Social Behavior
http://www.asanet.org/images/journals/docs/pdf/jhsb/Sep10JHSBFeature.pdf
What I like about this paper is it's a sociological paper that attempts
to look at casuality. Sociology is a science by the fact that it ends
with an -ology and rarely do proper scientific principles get applied,
and by proper I mean positivistic. (Anyone who knows me knows I'm a fan
of qualitative research too but usually when I'm around quantitative
people, and vice versa, because both are necessary for truths in mental
health, social care and behavioural control.) Establishing causality is
vital. It's also very difficult because there are so many factors.
Close-mindedness, bias and prejudice often means that researchers miss
interpret evidence or don't consider the right variables. There's also
the problem of fashions and fads in thinking in mental health and social
care. Anyway....
In the paper the authors make a useful analogy about casuality in drug use.
"slow and careful driving cannot be viewed as a cause of reckless
driving even though the former almost invariably precedes the latter"
The hypothesis is that cannabis is a gateway drug to other harder drugs.
From personal experience this isn't true. I tried cannabis before I took
harder drugs but the drug itself was never the gateway, even in the
aspect where it's the gateway to realising that what people had told me
about drugs was bullshit. I'm sure someone smarter than me will have
made this point better: the drug may be a gateway because people try it,
find it's amazing then think "so perhaps all the other stuff I've been
told about drugs is a lie too." It's nothing to do with the drug though.
It's all about social constructs.
Finding casuality is a bitch. Here's a snip from the paper that might
elucidate how hard it is.
"While there is not reliable support for the notion that frustrated
economic aspirations cause drug use and abuse, a growing literature
provides evidence
that exposure to various stressful stimuli elevates drug use and abuse.
It seems plausible, then, that the link between marijuana use and other
illicit drug use and abuse reflects a causal effect of stress exposure
on both types of behaviors. That is, teen exposure to stressful life
conditions may explain the link between adolescent marijuana use and
later use and abuse of other illicit substances."
Contact with the criminal underworld may be more plausible as a factor
in the gateway effect. Many people never meet a proper dealer, i.e.
someone who makes their living selling drugs. They'll usually know smoke
cannabis and buy it off them occassionally but they're rarely in contact
with the true suppliers. The regular smokers usually find someone to buy
from directly. Patterns in buying can be different with some people
buying in bulk for personal use (it's much more economically effective)
whereas others stick to getting it regularly. There are poorer places of
London where it's easy to get off street dealers. Many people get into
harder drug through music culture. It's rare to be in an acid techno
club back in the day and be offered cannabis but anyone could get pills.
There are many paths to get into drugs.
The authors make the point about the ludacrousy of government health
policy but with more big words than I used in my response to the UK's
drug strategy consultation recently. I used the example from South Park
where the counsellor who's been telling everyone that drugs are bad
tries them for the first time and realises they're good. Very good. I'm
not sure if this factor has been observed in other research into the
gateway hypothisis.
At the moment I'm either too tired through lack of nutrition or the
effects of depression to read and understand this paper like I used to
be able to. I can barely get half way through it. There's no point in me
commenting on it now.
No comments:
Post a Comment