A unique answer to the perennial question--why do college students drink so much? Most American college campuses are home to a vibrant drinking scene where students frequently get wasted, train-wrecked, obliterated, hammered, destroyed, and decimated. The terms that university students most commonly use to describe severe alcohol intoxication share a common theme: destruction, and even after repeated embarrassing, physically unpleasant, and even violent drinking episodes, students continue to go out drinking together. In Getting Wasted, Thomas Vander Ven provides a unique answer to the perennial question of why college students drink. Vander Ven argues that college students rely on "drunk support:" contrary to most accounts of alcohol abuse as being a solitary problem of one person drinking to excess, the college drinking scene is very much a social one where students support one another through nights of drinking games, rituals and rites of passage. Drawing on over 400 student accounts, 25 intensive interviews, and one hundred hours of field research, Vander Ven sheds light on the extremely social nature of college drinking. Giving voice to college drinkers as they speak in graphic and revealing terms about the complexity of the drinking scene, Vander Ven argues that college students continue to drink heavily, even after experiencing repeated bad experiences, because of the social support that they give to one another and due to the creative ways in which they reframe and recast violent, embarrassing, and regretful drunken behaviors. Provocatively, Getting Wasted shows that college itself, closed and seemingly secure, encourages these drinking patterns and is one more example of the dark side of campus life.

This book examines certain cases where social and psychological issues are present among adolescents and adults with substance abuse problems. Topics discussed include cross-cultural parent-child relations; prevention strategies for parents on adolescent smoking; the national youth anti-drug media campaign; cocaine-dependent patients with antisocial personality disorder and cognitive performance in chronic street drug users.

What are drug courts? Do they work? Why are they so popular? Should countries be expanding them or rolling them back? These are some of the questions this volume attempts to answer. Simultaneously popular and problematic, loved and loathed, drug courts have proven an enduring topic for discussion in international drug policy debates. Starting in Miami in the 1980s and being exported enthusiastically across the world, we now have a range of international case studies to re-examine their effectiveness. Whereas traditional debates tended towards binaries like "do they work?", this volume attempts to unpick their export and implementation, contextualising their efficacy. Instead of a simple yes or no answer, the book provides key insights into the operation of drug courts in various parts of the world. The case studies range from a relatively successful small-scale model in Australia, to the large and unwieldy business of drug courts in the US, to their failed scale-up in Brazil and the small and institutionally adrift models that have been tried in England, Scotland, Wales and Ireland. The book concludes that although drug courts can be made to work in very specific niche contexts, the singular focus on them as being close to a "silver bullet" obscures the real issues that societies must address, including (but not limited to) a more comprehensive and full-spectrum focus on diverting drug-involved individuals away from the criminal justice system.

The term impulsivity is commonly used to describe a person who is prone to act on whim without considering the long-term consequences of his or her actions. Several different definitions and measures have been established to examine impulsive behaviour in a variety of populations such as substance abuse addicts, adolescents, brain-damaged patients and those who suffer from eating disorders. Impulsivity is a construct both complex and multi-dimensional. It has been characterised as an inability to inhibit appropriate behaviours or to delay gratification, acting without forethought or sufficient information and the failure to correct inappropriate responses. Its multiple descriptive features have led some to suggest that impulsivity is not a unitary construct, but rather comprises "several related phenomena which are classified together as impulsivity". It has been linked to various negative outcomes including criminality, delinquency, extramarital affairs and gambling. This book gathers the latest research from around the globe in this field.

Twelve states, mostly in the West, have enacted laws allowing the use of marijuana for medical purposes, and many thousands of patients are seeking relief from a variety of serious illnesses by smoking marijuana or using other herbal cannabis preparations. Meanwhile, the federal Drug Enforcement Administration refuses to recognise these state laws and continues to investigate and arrest, under federal statute, medical marijuana providers and users in those states and elsewhere. Claims and counterclaims about medical marijuana -- much debated by journalists and academics, policymakers at all levels of government, and interested citizens -- include the following: Marijuana is harmful and has no medical value; marijuana effectively treats the symptoms of certain diseases; smoking is an improper route of drug administration; marijuana should be rescheduled to permit medical use; state medical marijuana laws send the wrong message and lead to increased illicit drug use; the medical marijuana movement undermines the war on drugs; patients should not be arrested for using medical marijuana; the federal government should allow the states to experiment and should not interfere with state medical marijuana programs; medical marijuana laws harm the federal drug approval process; the medical cannabis movement is a cynical ploy to legalise marijuana and other drugs. With strong opinions being expressed on all sides of this complex issue, the debate over medical marijuana does not appear to be approaching resolution.

On a summer night in 2007, the Azure Party, part of Sydney's annual gay and lesbian Mardi Gras, is underway. Alongside the party outfits, drugs, lights, and DJs is a volunteer care team trained to deal with the drug-related emergencies that occasionally occur. But when police appear at the gates with drug-detecting dogs, mild panic ensues. Some patrons down all their drugs, heightening their risk of overdose. Others try their luck at the gates. After twenty-six attendees are arrested with small quantities of illicit substances, the party is shut down and the remaining partygoers disperse into the city streets. For Kane Race, the Azure Party drug search is emblematic of a broader technology of power that converges on embodiment, consumption, and pleasure in the name of health. In "Pleasure Consuming Medicine," he illuminates the symbolic role that the illicit drug user fulfills for the neoliberal state. As he demonstrates, the state's performance of moral sovereignty around substances designated "illicit" bears little relation to the actual dangers of drug consumption; in fact, it exacerbates those dangers.

Race does not suggest that drug use is risk-free, good, or bad, but rather that the regulation of drugs has become a site where ideological lessons about the propriety of consumption are propounded. He argues that official discourses about drug use conjure a space where the neoliberal state can be seen to be policing the "excesses" of the amoral market. He explores this normative investment in drug regimes and some "counterpublic health" measures that have emerged in response. These measures, which Race finds in certain pragmatic gay men's health and HIV prevention practices, are not cloaked in moralistic language, and they do not cast health as antithetical to pleasure.

Major depression affects approximately 10 million Americans or roughly 5% of the population and is the leading cause of disability in the United States. Similarly, alcohol problems, including at-risk drinking, alcohol abuse, and alcohol dependence, are highly prevalent. Patients with depression frequently have alcohol problems. Alcohol problems in depressed patients present diagnostic and management challenges and may adversely affect the course of depression and its response to standard therapies. It is important to understand the psychobiology of the co-morbidity of depression and alcohol use disorders and to develop new treatment modalities for patients with this co-morbidity. This book will contribute to this goal. The contributors to this book are the best international experts in the field of the co-morbidity of depression and alcohol use disorders. This important book will be of interest to physicians, psychologists, mental health counsellors, other clinicians, medical and psychology students, and medical residents.

The meth epidemic has touched every State in the country, draining resources, causing serious environmental damage and destroying lives. SAMHSA's Drug Abuse Warning Network [DAWN], showed that in the early to mid-1990's, methamphetamine use was on the rise. The treatment episode data confirmed this: treatment admissions for meth use grew through the 1990's, increasing fivefold between 1992 and 2002. The most recent treatment episode data show that 15 States have higher rates of admission for amphetamine use, largely meth, than for heroin or cocaine. In just those 15 States, there were over 102,000 admissions for amphetamine treatment, versus 73,000 combined admissions for heroin and cocaine. Nationwide, there were more than 151,000 admissions for amphetamine treatment. To say that meth is highly addictive is an understatement, and it presents unique clinical challenges for treatment. Meth produces a short, intense rush, followed by a long-lasting sense of euphoria. Addiction to meth is caused by the way the drug alters the brain and leaves the users to compulsively seek more meth. Chronic use of the drug also leads to increased tolerance, prompting the user to take higher or more frequent doses of the drug to get the same effect. Moreover, meth users may also develop severe psychotic and paranoid behaviour. Meth users who do seek treatment often relapse and continue chronic meth use. There are currently no medications that demonstrate effectiveness in treating meth addiction. But intense behavioral interventions have proven effective. The largest controlled study of meth treatment conducted by the Center for Substance Abuse Treatment demonstrated positive post-treatment outcomes for 60 percent of the treatment sample, which reported no meth use and which had urine samples that tested negative for meth. Nonetheless, traditional treatment programs for alcohol and marijuana are inadequate for dealing with the unique clinical challenges presented by this drug. Such treatment programs, sometimes the only treatment option available in communities hardest hit by the meth epidemic, result in very poor post-treatment outcomes for meth users. This represents our greatest challenge: how do we ensure that our Federal treatment efforts are addressing the meth epidemic in measurable ways in the areas hardest hit by the scourge, in many cases very rural areas?

Alcoholic beverages are divided into three general classes: beers, wines, and spirits. Such beverages contain ethanol, a psychoactive drug that has a depressant effect. The relationship between alcohol consumption and health has been the subject of formal scientific research since at least 1926. Moderate alcohol use seems to offer some health benefits, particularly for the heart, but too much alcohol puts a person at risk of adverse health consequences. This book provides current research on alcohol and health. Included is the relationship between alcohol and coronary artery disease and the erosion potential of alcohol on teeth. Since it is generally accepted that about one-third of all cancers are related to dietary factors, this book reviews the modulating effects of red wine and beer on heterocyclic aromatic amines carcinogenesis and how to minimise the formation of these compounds. Research on ochratoxin, a compound found in wine, is also presented due to its importance on health.

* Why do people use drugs?
* What happens when people are intoxicated?
* Are we being medicated into normality?
Drugs and intoxication have been facts of human life for millennia. Across the world, many people use illicit drugs, smoke, and drink alcohol. Yet very little has been written about their experiences.
Academics, politicians and media reporting on the topic tend only to consider intoxication when it manifests as a social problem. This book takes a more nuanced view, and examines drug and alcohol use from a wider number of perspectives. It discusses issues such as the history of drug and alcohol use, the attractions of intoxication to individuals, and the control and regulation of drugs and their users. It also examines evidence for the rise of the so-called pharmaceutical society, and asks whether society is on the cusp of a revolution in psychoactive substance use.
This engagingly written text will be essential reading for upper-level students taking a range of courses, including the sociology of drugs, deviance and social control, and drugs and crime. It will also appeal to social work students, and anyone working with drug and alcohol users looking for a level-headed analysis of the pleasures and pains, highs and lows, of substance use.

Addictive disorders are characterised by a division of the will, in which the addict is attracted both by a desire to continue the addictive behaviour and also by a desire to stop it. Academic perspectives on this predicament usually come from clinical and scientific standpoints, with the 'moral model' rejected as outmoded. But Christian theology has a long history of thinking and writing on such problems and offers insights which are helpful to scientific and ethical reflection upon the nature of addiction. Chris Cook reviews Christian theological and ethical reflection upon the problems of alcohol use and misuse, from biblical times until the present day. Drawing particularly upon the writings of St Paul the Apostle and Augustine of Hippo, a critical theological model of addiction is developed. Alcohol dependence is also viewed in the broader ethical perspective of the use and misuse of alcohol within communities.

Substance abuse is one of society's most serious problems. Drugs seem to be readily available in virtually every country in the world. Substance abuse is the overindulgence in and dependence of a drug or other chemical leading to effects that are detrimental to the individual's physical and mental health, or the welfare of others. The disorder is characterised by a pattern of continued pathological use of a medication, non-medically indicated drug or toxin, that results in repeated adverse social consequences related to drug use, such as failure to meet work, family, or school obligations, interpersonal conflicts, or legal problems. There are on-going debates as to the exact distinctions between substance abuse and substance dependence, but current practice standard distinguishes between the two by defining substance dependence in terms of physiological and behavioural symptoms of substance use, and substance abuse in terms of the social consequences of substance use. This book presents the latest research in the field.

Heroin, often viewed as the "hardest drug," looms large in the popular consciousness. Heroin addiction in Britain first began to cause concern during the 1920s, yet while one group of doctors regarded the addiction as a disease which required treatment, other physicians viewed it as a vice which demanded strict control. The medical community and the government have debated both the definition of addiction-medical condition, moral failing or social problem-and the method of dealing with addiction-medical treatment vs. legal controls. In Heroin, Alex Mold examines the interaction of the different approaches to heroin addiction and argues that the treatment of the addiction as a disease and the control of heroin as a social problem could, in practice, rarely be separated. Treatment became a way of controlling the addiction and the addicts themselves, but debates about the nature of addiction treatment and the methods used resulted in politicisation of the topic. During the late 1960s Drug Dependence Units (DDUs) were established as a means to combine both medical treatment and social control. The "British System" essentially treated addiction as a disease and offered maintenance-the administering of heroin or an opioid substitute on a long-term basis-as treatment. Maintenance proved to be a source of tension between psychiatrists specialising in addiction treatment and private and general practitioners who operated outside the DDUs. This conflict manifested itself in heated disputes on the pages of medical journals, in government committees and in disciplinary hearings before the General Medical Council. The same debates, conflicts and tensions which have beset drug addiction treatment since the beginning of the twentieth century persist today. Despite international laws and codes concerning addiction and treatment, there is much that is peculiar and significant about the British case. Drawing on government papers, private archival collections, medical journals, oral history sources and official reports, Mold presents the first detailed historical analysis on the subject. Historians, sociologists, addiction specialists and contemporary policy-makers can look to this groundbreaking study to learn from the past and shape the future response to heroin addiction.

Canada has received significant attention of late for initiating a government-sponsored medical marijuana program and for its flirtation with marijuana decriminalization. At best, these initiatives have contributed to Canada being seen as a reluctant ally by Washington, and, at worst, as a potential threat. The result of this impression is increasing American pressure to adopt more robust domestic security policies. At the same time, the Canadian public sees itself as holding unique values that differ from those held by its neighbour to the south. Supposedly these values are best reflected by a distinctive security outlook which produces reasonable responses to potential threats, a sharp contrast to the manic actions of the United States.

Chasing Dragons challenges these presumptions of difference and exposes the security politics and policy that they make possible. Focusing on the issues surrounding illicit drugs, Kyle Grayson examines how discourses and practices of security policy actually contribute to the construction of Canadian national and cultural identity. This analysis is also relevant beyond Canada. Crucially, this book identifies the dangers of underestimating the centrality of race and geopolitics to civic conceptions of nationality in liberal societies.

Chasing Dragons reconsiders the meaning of security. Additionally, it discusses avenues for resisting the insecurity produced by liberal states in the post-9/11 world. This critical approach reveals the pervasiveness of power in contemporary Canadian society, how this power is hidden, and the consequences for progressive social politics.

Cigarette smoking during childhood and adolescence produces significant health problems among young people, including cough and phlegm production, an increase in the number and severity of respiratory illnesses, decreased physical fitness, an unfavourable lipid profile and potential retardation in the rate of lung growth and the level of maximum lung function in addition to leading to long-term smoking and the numerous diseases connected with that including cancer and others. In this new book adolescent smoking is researched pertaining to the health complications that young adults will endure, as well as the different social aspects of what causes an adolescent to begin smoking in the first place including peer pressure. Several methods of smoking cessation are discussed.

"Julia" nervously emerges from her shabby tent in the suburban wastelands on the outskirts of Madrid to face another day of survival in one of Europe's most problematic ghettos: she is homeless, wanted by the police, and addicted to heroin and cocaine. She is also five months pregnant and rarely makes contact with support services. Welcome to the city shadows in Valdemingomez: a lawless landscape of drugs and violence where the third world meets the Wild West. Briggs and Monge entered this area with only their patience, some cigarettes and a mobile phone and collected vivid testimonies and images of Julia and others like her who live there. This important book documents what they found, locating these people's stories and situations in a political, economic and social context of spatial inequality and oppressive mechanisms of social control.

Tammara (Tammy) Johnson is an African-American woman in her fifties, an ex-addict with a 19-year heroin habit and a felony record, who works as the job development trainer for an in-patient drug treatment program in south suburban Chicago. Raised in a middle-class family, Tammy left home early because she could not live up to parental expectations. She turned to drugs and crime and was eventually incarcerated for selling drugs.
This book, the third in a trilogy about Chicago women by noted author Jody Raphael, is the story of Tammy's metamorphosis. Raphael's narrative, based on extensive interviews with Tammy and family members, shows the detrimental effects of incarceration on an already abused woman and illuminates Tammy's efforts to release herself from the literal and figurative prisons of abuse, addiction, crime, fear, and hopelessness.
Raphael uses the transit of Tammy's life--from childhood trauma to adult rehabilitation--to investigate the linkages between childhood sexual assault and domestic violence with women's drug addiction and then with crime. She uses Tammy's own words to demonstrate how childhood sexual assault and violence can make women poor and how dysfunctional coping strategies keep them poor. Tammy's story is a reminder that violence against women and girls economically impoverishes them by trapping them in addictions leading to crime and other self-destructive activities.

'Afghanistan is seen as a major drug producer, but its own people are becoming the victims. ... David Macdonald not only explores [the reasons for this] but also tells an addictive tale that is difficult to resist.' Shirazuddin Siddiqi, BBC 'This stunning book provides a first hand account of the Afghan drug problem. David Macdonald has written the definitive text on drugs in Afghanistan.' Professor Gerry Stimson, Executive Director, International Harm Reduction Association 'David Macdonald tells a story about the diversity of drug use in Afghanistan that no one has ever told before.' Ethan Nadelmann, Executive Director, Drug Policy Alliance, New York Afghanistan is the world's largest producer of opium and heroin. This book explores the devastating impact that the drugs trade has had on the Afghan people. Author David Macdonald has worked as a drugs advisor to the UN. Based on his extensive experience, this book breaks down the myths surrounding the cultivation and consumption of drugs, providing a detailed analysis of the history of drug use within the country. He examines the impact of over 25 years of continuous conflict, and shows how poverty and instability has led to an increase in drugs consumption. He also considers the recent rise in the use of pharmaceutical drugs, resulting in dangerous chemical cocktails and analyses the effect of Afghanistan's drug trade on neighbouring countries.

Methamphetamine (METH) abuse has become a major public health problem world-wide, as demonstrated by increases in the number of emergency room visits, substance abuse treatment episodes, and arrests attributable to METH manufacture and abuse. However, there are currently no pharmacological treatments for the wide range of symptoms associated with METH abuse. One of the reasons for this problem is that our knowledge of the cellular and molecular mechanisms underlying the development of METH-induced psychosis and dependence is limited. This book presents a review of the recent findings on METH abuse in humans. First by describing the background and physiological effects of METH in humans. Next, by discussing the clinical findings on METH abusers derived using brain imaging techniques (single photon emission computed tomography (SPECT), positron emission tomography (PET), magnetic resonance spectroscopy (MRS), and functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI)). Finally, by reviewing the potential therapeutic approaches for the treatment of METH abusers.

Organised crime puts on a smiley face. When the Summer of Love hit Britain in '88, Wayne embraced the bright new world of dance music, MDMA and all-night celebrations. But alongside the ecstasy, his natural East End entrepreneurial instincts kicked in, and he began to organise the infamous Genesis dance parties for thousands of kids. Wayne soon became a key figure in the high octane, technicolour rave scene. But beneath the shiny, smiley surfaces, he quickly found himself in a vicious world of violence, police harassment and organised crime, for which he was totally unsuited and unprepared. He was beaten by ex-paratroopers, menaced by gangsters, kidnapped, confronted with sawn off shotguns and threatened with murder, all so Britain could party like never before. When Class of '88 was first published, it was so popular that Foyles dedicated an entire window to the book for a month. Now, re-issued for the 30th anniversary, this is Wayne's very lively, highly individual account of the two years he spent as an illegal party promoter, leading the rave revolution which was sweeping the UK, changing lives, music and popular culture forever.

Benelong's Haven was the first residential alcohol and drug treatment program controlled and operated by an Aboriginal Australian. It was established by Val Bryant in 1974 in the Sydney suburb of Marrickville, before moving to the small township of Kinchela Creek on the mid-north coast of New South Wales three years later. The centre is one example of the different approaches Aboriginal people have developed to deal with the problem of drug and alcohol abuse in their communities, where people who have experienced problems with alcohol and drug use can leave their existing environment and come to a different place. Anthropologist Richard Chenhall first visited Benelong's Haven for two weeks in late 1997. At the invitation of Val Bryant, he returned later for an extended period of fieldwork, observing and participating in the centre's activities and getting to know staff and residents. There have been few studies that reflect Aboriginal social life in larger cities or in institutional settings. ""Benelong's Haven"" represents an attempt to examine, at the ethnographic level, the different ways in which individuals are shaped by, and interact within, the larger structures and social institutions that surround them. More specifically it documents an instance of Australian Aboriginal people trying to achieve change in their lives.

Addiction does begin with drug abuse when an individual makes a conscious choice to use drugs, but addiction is not just "a lot of drug use". Recent scientific research provides overwhelming evidence that not only do drugs interfere with normal brain functioning creating powerful feelings of pleasure, but they also have long-term effects on brain metabolism and activity. At some point, changes occur in the brain that can turn drug abuse into addiction, a chronic, relapsing illness. Those addicted to drugs suffer from a compulsive drug craving and usage and cannot quit by themselves. Treatment is necessary to end this compulsive behaviour. This book includes within its scope leading-edge research on cocaine and heroin abuse.

Required reading for anyone wishing to be conversant with tobacco control policy, the book is edited by Kenneth E. Warner-dean of the School of Public Health at the University of Michigan and a leading tobacco policy researcher-who leads with an overview of the field. Warner's overview is supported by reprints of some of the field's most significant articles, written by leading scholars and practitioners. The topics discussed are:* Taxation and Price* Clean Indoor Air Laws* Advertising, Ad Bans, and Counteradvertising* Possession, Use, and Purchase (PUP) Laws and Sales to Minors* Cessation Policy* Comprehensive State Laws

Substance abuse is one of society's most serious problems. Drugs seem to be readily available even in elementary schools, which attests to the success of the drug purveyors and the failure of law enforcement officials, education administrators and parents. As an example, in the U.S. in 2003, there were nearly 1.7 million admissions to publicly funded substance abuse treatment programs. Most admissions (23.2 percent) were for alcohol treatment. Marijuana accounted for the largest percentage of illicit drug admissions (15.4 percent), followed by heroin (14.4 percent). This book presents new and important research dealing with treatments and treatment programs aimed at alleviating the misery and loses to society of this vicious behavioural disorder.