Boshears_suburban Conference 2009

Social Bonds in the Initiation of Methamphetamine Use

Miriam Boeri¹, Paul Boshears², David Gibson¹, and Liam Harbry³

¹Kennesaw State University ²The European Graduate School ³DeKalb County Drug Court

Based on our ethnographic study of 100 current and former users of methamphetamine, we found that participants in this study overwhelmingly, reference the social pressures and environments that initiate, spur, and inhibit their use or cessation of methamphetamine and other drugs. In privileging the social component of addiction, we contribute to the developing literature on the social conceptualization of addiction (May 2001, Gibson et al. 2004, Hughes 2007, Pilkington 2007, Graham et al. 2008).

Theoretical Background Hughes (2007) proposes a “social conceptualization” of addiction emphasizing substance abuse “as a set of embodied social practices.” “Addiction” is a discursive practice – a narrative that people perform. In performing this discourse, which has developed within a short but history, addicts affirm and reinvigorate their identities as “addicts”. The discourse surrounding addiction itself limits how we can understand addiction as well as how we might transform the phenomenon. Let's reexamine our fundamental assumptions:

Notions of Selfhood¹

R A

B

¹ Kasulis, Thomas P. 2002. Intimacy or Integrity: Philosophy and Cultural Difference. Honolulu: University of Hawai`i Press.

Notions of Selfhood

I H G (Kasulis 2002)

B

C

A F

D E This is the essential purpose of the prison – to disallow relationships between society and the prisoner

Notions of Selfhood

A R B Spouse, Parent, Friend, etc.

(Kasulis 2002)

Spouse, Child, Friend, etc.

Notions of Selfhood

A

(Kasulis 2002)

B

Notions of Selfhood

B C

E F A D

(Kasulis 2002)

G

Supporting the Social Conceptualization •

Initiation to methamphetamine, according to our respondents, occurred in familiar social networks: among family, friends, and co-workers.

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As the literature has indicated (Pilkington 2007), security, trust and mutual accountability are central factors in the decision making process of drug users.

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Without the proper social capital, access to substances of abuse is greatly impacted (Sexton et al 2005).

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In order for the two conditions to be met, respondents had to perform their roles properly, in performing these roles, they reinforced their identities

Family Between 2000 and 2005, 15,000 children were found in meth labs in the U.S. (Zernike 2005)

“So all my dad’s friends were junkies. They were shooting Demerol, everything you could shoot. ...[H]e was my...dad’s best friend. ...[F]rom the time I was twelve I’d seen these dudes firing dope, shooting dope up until I was eighteen years old…But one day I come in and I said let me try some of that. I poured some in a spoon, shot some water in it, the dude was trying to tell my dad, ‘you need to help him or let me help him or something’, before he had it out I had it pulled up and fired it in my arm just like a champ. Just like I was a professional at it” (34 year old white male respondent).

“It was with my step-grandmother…she handed me some in my hand and said, ‘eat it,’ and I did and it kept me up for a while” (22 year old white female)

Pilkington (2007), “young people’s narratives are infused more with notions of security, trust and mutual accountability than they are with ‘risk’. In making drugs choices – regardless of whether the choice itself is to use, experiment with, or abstain from drugs – it is the friendship group [here we extend it to include the family] which is the key reference point for young people and provides a safe and secure context in which to make those choices” (386).

“I know that’s why I started. My brother – I didn’t think anything he did was wrong, you know. He was perfect to me” (25 year old white female).

This seems to support the call for an expanded sense of “risk” because what is considered risky behavior is no longer the outcome of consuming substances of abuse (i.e. having a hang over in the morning, becoming habituated to tobacco, developing a methamphetamine dependence), rather the risk is an ontological one – namely losing membership in an identity-forming relationship, be it as a member of a kinship system or peer group

Friends For many, drug use provided the catalyst to new friends or social groups they had not had before. Drug use, and addiction, often appeared to be the test of compatibility between people and groups.

“I guess having it [attention] in the private school, you know, and I guess

being popular then and not being as popular in public school, that was a reason to do things I did to get that attention as the crazy guy or the class clown again. I guess doing drugs, it was new at the time, you know. Hanging out with these people, these new people, I found acceptance in them...” (30-year-old, white male).

These networks of friends that are consistently using drugs together provide the culture and adopted norms that are conducive for continued use. These social bonds provide the people and connections to access methamphetamine (or other drugs), opening gateways to various settings to conduct illicit drug use, and provide social solidarity among the individuals involved.

Friends as Family “I guess being in her house and staying with her, we were all like a family and that’s just what we did and I liked it. I liked the way it made me feel.”

What made her feel so good was not simply the effects of the methamphetamine, but the familiarity itself, so it seems. Whether respondents were using methamphetamine with their actual family, or friends whom they consider family, as long as these purpose-full drug-using relationships were maintained, their drug use would continue. This insight is crucial to understanding patterns of cessation and relapse. To cease to be an addict is to cease to be oneself, a symbolic (but fundamentally real) suicide.

Reciprocal Relationships “Yeah, my friends always got it. I never had to worry about getting it” (26-year-old, white male).

Not having to worry about it is precisely the nature of culture. Douglas (1992) culture is a “system of persons holding one another mutually accountable.” That is, reciprocity is central to understanding addiction. •

Evident in the “cooking” practices – you steal for me, I “cook” for you

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It is the fundamental assumption in the 12-Step process