Psychosocial profile of the drug addict (the Caim - Mérida case)

He pathological use of psychoactive substances It has become a serious public health problem (Evans, 1987), to the point that, at present, there is talk of pandemic (Thorne, 1985). The severity of the problem is accentuated by the difficult treatment and complicated of the rehabilitation process of the people who suffer (Crowley, 1988; Harrison, 1994; Jones, 1995; Roback, 1996).

In this Psychology Line article, we will talk about Psychosocial profile of the drug addict (the Caim - Mérida case).

1. Demographic data
2. Drug -dependent behavior
3. Method
4. First results
5. Results and comparative

Demographic data

Some figures They can help illustrate what is raised above. For example, Garbari (1999) points out that, in the US of North America, by 1996, treatment needs were 5.5 million individuals for illegal drug use and 13 million individuals, for alcohol consumption. Drug control programs went from 650 million dollars in 1982 to 13 billion dollars in 1997, all without including tobacco and not mentioning the relationship between drug addiction problems with the significant Increased morbidity, mortality, suicide rate, crime, sexual abuse, domestic violence and HIV infections.

In Venezuela (Garbari, 1999), The sociodemographic profile From the person attending drug use is given by the predominance of the male sex (91%), 15 to 30 years of age (68%), single (74%), with an incomplete secondary school educational level (65 %), unemployed or unoccupied (56%).

Regarding consumption habit, the person who attends treatment by drug abuse or dependence is characterized by the beginning of consumption between 10 and 19 years (83%), daily consumption (38%), illicit drug of start cannabis (45 %), cocaine secondary drug (59%), cocaine and crack tertiary drugs (44%), drugs with greater impact, cocaine and crack (85%).

According to Uzcategui (1998), the Cocaine Consumer Profile and its derivatives, attended to the José Félix Ribas Foundation, in Mérida, is characterized by a start age that goes between 9 and 20 years (90.2% ), being more early in the case of female from 9 to 12 years (40%) than in the masculine with an age of 13 to 16 years (44.1%). The most frequent starting drug is alcohol (80.4%) and the most general consumption motivation is the invitation of a relative or friend (52.7%).

The most common consumption starting place is its own or home community (71.5%), with a consumption frequency of several times a day (41.1%).Impresses, those who have worked with drug addicts from different nationalities and social classes, the consistency of some "characteristics" or "ways of being" of drug addicts in general.

Drug -dependent behavior

For Yablonsky (cited by Luna, 1998), who has investigated in this area for more than 35 years, The drug addict denies that is in difficulties with the psychoactive substance (illusion of control); The family also tries to hide the difficulties, to deny it, clinging to the illusion that their relative is not a drug dependent. The most systematic event is that the drug addict lies to itself. "The drug addict is drugged to promise that he will not get back. And when he accepts his difficulties in something in the face of the substance, he begins to hold others responsible for their problems (victimism). Another consistent event is that the drug dependent knows what are the weak and strong points of each of his relatives, a fact that allows him to manipulate or "blackmail" his environment to achieve what he wants. The drug dependent only has one idea in the head and she is: ¿How and when I will consume again? Several authors call this irresistible desire "compulsion. Lying is something completely normal for the drug dependent, it is part of his world, reaching the point of saying lies to himself.Maselli (1985) describes Three periods in the development of drug dependence.

The first occurs from Initial contact with psychoactive substance, until the moment in which teachers find out about their hobby. This stage is called by some "honeymoon", since the drug dependent feels its relationship with the substance as "positive". The "escape", or a moment of active effect of the substance, is an element that explains, in large part, the attachment to the psychoactive substance: during a brief period, the substance makes the drug dependent forgot the problems and discomforts, staying with what "Well" of the substance. For some experts the first period is rarely less than two years or greater than four, very relative fact because it depends on the substance and the person. At some point the person tries to "free" himself from the substance, but realizes the difficulty of achieving it and begins to lie to himself. The second period appears with the public revelation of the situation. This produces what could be called a family shock.

Denials, cancellations, feelings of guilt and helplessness make their appearance. The drug dependent begins to promise that he will leave the drug; The family believes in their promises and pleases it in their material needs, since it dominates the feeling of guilt. The family begins to live ambivalent behaviors: gifts and aggressiveness to try to control deviants. A very complex pathology is then formed.

From the moment in which family members and, more rarely, the drug dependent, They ask for specialized advice The third period begins. In this last period the family and the young man have overcome denial, self -deception, victimhood and are integrated into treatment.On the other hand, the coadicts, often family members, can sabotage the treatment and prevent the abstinence of drug dependent. The denial, by the family, is generally the first obstacle in therapy. It is not accepted that the relative in question is a patient.

After denial, when the drug dependent has been integrated into treatment, it comes, in most cases, a family aggressiveness phase towards the drug dependent. It is common to observe the appearance of new symptoms or strange behaviors, in some family members, when the drug dependent is integrated to treatment or is "healing".

Method

The evolution described so far, has been based on documentation and predominantly foreign studies. Venezuelan research on the personal characteristics of the addict has been quite limited and this report represents an exploratory effort with the purpose of knowing some little explored aspects of drug consumers.

The questions we asked were three: ¿There could be a particular motivational profile of the drug addict? ¿There are differences between the self -esteem of the addict and that of the general population? ¿It will be possible to establish some personality functional pattern between the addict, as an isolated person, and the members of their close family environment?

Procedure with the close collaboration of all personnel of the Mérida Integral Care Center (CAIM) of the José Felix Ribas Foundation, it was decided Manage a multi -salad multi -administered questionnaire, To all users of the foundation's consultation, between the months of March to June of the year 2000. In this way, a sample composed of 115 people, 73 consumers of psychoactive substances and 42 accompanying relatives were obtained. It was not taken into consideration whether people were regular or casual users of the service, or if it was the first consultation. Only It was verified that the person declared having problems with consumption of illegal substances or had a relative affected by the problem.For the purposes of the comparisons, the Andes University (2230 candidates of different specialties) was selected from the new database of the Andes (2230 This group represents the general population of the Mérida region.

The multisalla is a Likert type questionnaire of six points composed of a total of 153 items. It consists of a set of subscales aimed at measuring personal achievement (Romero García and Salom de Bustamante, 1990), internality (Romero García, 1981), Psychological Normality (Esqueda Torres, 1997), Aggression (Escalante, 1995), Depression (Escalante, 1994), General Self -esteem (Rosemberg, 1979), Anxiety (Torres, 1991) and psychological mismatch (Torres Esqueda, 1997). In all cases, the subjects are asked to indicate the degree of disagreement or agreement they plan to have with each of the statements that make up the multiscala.

In this way, it is possible to obtain a direct metric of the self -perception that the individual expresses in each of the measured dimensions.Results and discussion to have an idea of ​​the distribution of the results, are presented in Table 1, the means and the standard deviations, in each of the measured variables, not only for the group of drug dependent users (1) and the group of relatives (2), but the results of the normative sample (3) have been added.It is almost tempting to let each one individually deduce their conclusions, at least in relation to the notable and obvious differences between the groups.

First results

Above all If you keep in mind that the normative sample, It represents A very stable reference point of the observed variations In the general population regarding the variables under evaluation. The normative sample was randomly derived taking into consideration the size of the group surveyed in the Foundation, balancing age and sex, so that there was no experimental bias in comparisons.It follows, from the summary analysis of the means of the means, that the consultants for drug addiction, compared to the regulatory group, systematically shows, minor scores in self -esteem, psychological normality (Nortot) and the measure derived from adjustment Psychological (adjust). Similarly, a greater score in anxiety, depression, psychological mismatch (RTOT) and aggressiveness is detected for the same group.

A special comment deserves the comparison between motivational measures: Total internality (IT) and motivation to achievement (achievement). The group of drug dependent users (and that of the relatives) appears with the lowest score to the extent of internality (which suggests its strong tendency to externalality or to the systematic external attribution of the events that explain their behavior); That same trend is observed when it comes to motivation to achievement. In this variable, as can be observed, the group of drug addicts and the group of relatives obtain a lower score than the normative group. This fact seems to suggest that international and motivation to achieve.

Although it does not seem necessary insist on directly observable differences Between the consultant group due to drug problems, their relatives and the normative sample, it will be useful to highlight some comparisons of interest between the three groups. To do this, we must refer to Table 2, where the statistical information offered by a variance analysis (ANOVA) is summarized, which allows to establish that there are significant differences between the three groups, in each of the dimensions measured measured.

*Editor's note: All tables are annexed*

Results and comparative

The content of Table 2 shows that they exist highly significant differences between groups in relation to each of the measured dimensions. However, it is necessary to know which specific group differs or introduces greater variation in the scores for each variable. With that purpose in mind, a proof of multiple comparisons was carried out, which is added to Table 3.

It can be seen that The drug user group differs from the group of relatives, statistically significantly, to the extent of self -esteem, psychological mismatch, aggression and depression. It can also be highlighted that in terms of aggressiveness it is concerned, although drug dependent observes very high scores in relation to the normative sample, it is family members who show a level of higher aggressiveness. At such a level that they even differ statistically from their relatives with drug problems.On the other hand, in terms of motivational measures taken, there are no differences between drug dependent groups and relatives.

Externality, that is, the tendency to consider that other agents or factors are the guilty of the personal experiences that they have lived, It is the central descriptive characteristic for the two subsams. The motivation for achievement is low for relatives, but not substantially different from that observed in the normative population. However, that is not the case observed for drug dependents, which show statistically significant differences in relation to the normative sample.It follows, then, from the results reported, that the drug use consultant is a person of low self -esteem, with severe general psychological imbus, high anxiety, depressed and aggressive. Likewise, that the relatives surveyed show high indices of anxiety and aggressiveness, probably associated with the feelings of helplessness, guilt and helplessness produced by witnessing the progressive collapse of a loved one.

An alternative interpretation that it must be investigated later would be that, precisely, by the high level of anxiety and aggressiveness, Those relatives end with an addict, disorganized and depressed. In addition, it was found that motivational measures such as internality and motivation to achievement do not suggest any particular pattern of expression (when both groups are compared); Although it is clear that both drug addicts, and their relatives are systematically more external than usually observed in the normative population.

Apparently, The perception of events control is predominantly external Because, assuming direct responsibility for the behavior of personal or family addiction, would be extremely expensive in terms of the emotional commitment that this implies. It must be added, as a final consideration, that these results represent a first approach to the study of the user's psychosocial profile of psychoactive substances (consultant of the José Félix Ribas Foundation of Mérida) and its closest relatives. Obviously, more research will be necessary to answer the concerns and questions that emerge from this work.

This article is merely informative, in psychology-online we have no power to make a diagnosis or recommend a treatment. We invite you to go to a psychologist to treat your particular case.

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