Drugs and Alcohol

1. Drugs and Alcohol Module 7

2. Facts About Alcohol Consumption • The nation’s 12 million undergraduates drink 4 billion cans of beer annually, averaging 55 six-packs each. At $446 per student, the average student spends more on alcoholic drinks than on soft drinks and textbooks combined. • There is a negative correlation between college grades and the amount of alcohol consumed. One study found that “A” students have, on average, 3 drinks a week, whereas those making “D’s” and “F’s” average 11 drinks a week. Students with high academic standing drink less in virtually all contexts than students with low academic standing.

3. Facts About Alcohol Consumption • 95% of violent crime on college campuses is alcohol or drug-related. 73% of the assailants and 55% of the victims of rape had used alcohol or other drugs. Two-thirds of student suicides were legally drunk at the time, and 90% of fatal fraternity hazing accidents involve drinking. • Students in the Northeast drink more than those in the South or the West. • Alcohol and drug using rates decline overall during the mid-20s, when serious responsibilities often kick in. Being engaged, married, or even remarried quickly brings down alcohol use.

4. Student Project: • Go to the Web site: http://www.alcoholandotherdrugs.com • Read three chapters • Prepare a written and oral report for the class

5. Dependence and AddictionHandout 7-2 • Drug Use Survey Handout • Comes from National Institute on Drug Abuse • No norms are provided, but if respondents are answering “yes” to three or more questions on the “Drug Use” survey or obtain a total score of 8 or more on the AUDIT, they may be abusing drugs or alcohol. • High scores on AUDIT’s first three questions suggest hazardous alcohol use, elevated scores on items 4 through 6 imply the presence or emergence of alcohol dependence, and high scores on the remaining items suggest harmful alcohol use.

6. Handout 7-3The Internet Addiction Test • What is addiction? • How do you know you are addicted? Scoring • Add the numbers you have placed before the 20 questions. • Total scores can range from 20 to 100 • 20-49 points indicates that you are an average online user You may surf a bit too long, but you have control over your usage • 50-79 points indicates that you are experiencing occasional or frequent problems because of the Internet and should consider its full impact on your life. • 80-100 indicates that Internet usage is causing significant problems in your life that need to be addressed.

7. Internet Addiction • Young suggests that Internet addiction can injure children’s lives, destroy friendships and marriages, and cost jobs. The heavy users Young interviewed often indicated that Internet usage was part of an addictive pattern. In fact, 52 % were in recovery programs for other addictions and 54% had a history of depression. For help contact http://www.netaddiction.com

8. What is Addiction? • This is all controversial. • Critics have raised questions about the validity and reliability of the test as well as the way the term, addiction, is used. • Addiction has traditionally meant a craving for a substance with physical symptoms such as aches, nausea, and distress following sudden withdrawal. Certain behaviors – gambling, the internet – can become compulsive and dysfunctional. Should we extend the addiction concept to cover such behaviors?

9. What Might the Real Problem Be? • depression • a deficit in a person’s life • loneliness • There are many people who acknowledge that their Internet time is out of control. There are support groups such as Jean Baker Wunder, director for Family Support Groups Inc. who get calls all the time for help. • What is the problem with calling this a disease? The person may expect sympathy for the problem rather than seeking help for him/herself. • There is a less than serious group on the Internet called the “Webaholics” that offers web sites where webaholics can make their confessions.

10. Alcohol ConsumptionHandout 7-4 Answer the questions on the Alcohol Consumption Questionnaire. Be honest with yourself; nobody else is looking at it. Every five items measure a different expectancy regarding alcohol’s effects. • Items 1–5 assess the belief that alcohol is a global, positive transforming agent • 6–10, the expectation that alcohol enhances both social and physical pleasure • 11–15, the view that alcohol enhances sexual experience and performance • 16–20, the expectation that alcohol enhances power and aggression • 21–25, the belief that alcohol increases social assertiveness • 26–30, the belief that alcohol reduces tension. • Respondents can score from 0 to 5 on each factor, with higher scores reflecting a greater expectancy that alcohol does have the stated effect.

11. Alcohol ConsumptionHandout 7-4 • The single best expectancy predictor for heavy and context-dependent drinkers was social and physical pleasure • the most powerful expectancy predictor for problematic drinkers was tension reduction. • Brown, S. (1985)

12. Three Drinking Styles: • Heavy drinkers frequently drink to the point of physical distress. • Problem drinkers not only drink heavily, but also experience trouble with authorities as a result—for example, disorderly conduct, driving while under the influence, warnings from school authorities. Frequently, problem drinkers do not label their own drinking pattern as problematic. • Context-dependent drinkers typically drink in social settings such as bars or lounges with new acquaintances or strangers rather than at home by themselves or with family.

13. The top 10 reasons college students give for consuming alcohol • It increases my feelings of social ability • It relieves anxiety or tension • It makes me feel elated or euphoric. • It makes me less inhibited in thinking, saying, or doing certain things. • It enables me to go along with my friends. • It enables me t experience a different state of consciousness. • It makes me less inhibited sexually. • It enables me to stop worrying. • It alleviates depression. • It makes me less self-conscious

14. Rohypnol – A Date Rape Drug • Street names: “roofies,” rooches” • Estimated to be 7 – 10 times more potent than valium. • Produces profound, prolonged sedation, a feeling of well-being, and short-term memory loss. • Legally prescribed in 64 countries for insomnia and as a preoperative anesthetic, it has never been approved for use in the United States.

15. Rohypnol – A Date Rape Drug • In the mid-1990s it became a tool of predators who would spike the drinks of unsuspecting young women and then rape them. • It causes sedation within 15 minutes • The effects are boosted by alcohol or marijuana • Women often can’t remember what happened to them

16. What can women do? • Don’t drink a beverage you didn’t open yourself • Don’t exchange or share drinks with anyone • Don’t accept a drink from a punch bowl. • Don’t drink from a container that’s being passed around • Don’t leave your drink unattended. • Don’t drink anything that has an unusual taste or appearance. • When you get a drink from the bar, watch it being poured and carry it to your table by yourself.

17. Three types of Drinkers • Heavy drinkers frequently drink to the point of physical distress. • Problem drinkers not only drink heavily but also experience trouble with authorities as a result – for example, disorderly conduct, driving while under the influence, warnings from school authorities. Frequently, problem drinkers do NOT label their own drinking pattern as problematic. • Context-dependent drinkers typically drink in social settings such as bars or lounges with new acquaintances or strangers, rather than at home by themselves or with family.

18. Exercise Alcohol ExpectanciesHandout • Items 1-5 = the belief that alcohol is a global, positive transforming agent • 6-10= the expectancy that alcohol enhances both social and physical pleasure • 11-15= alcohol enhances sexual experience and performance • 16-20= alcohol enhances power and aggression • 21-25 = alcohol increases social assertiveness • 26-30 = alcohol reduces tension • Score from 0 to 5 on each factor with higher scores reflecting a great expectancy that alcohol has the stated (above) effect.

19. AEQ Results • Research has shown that scores on the AEQ are highly correlated with adult and adolescent drinking practices, included problem drinking and alcoholism. These expectancies are better predictors of drinking behavior than demographic or background variables. Expectancies measured in seventh and eighth grades predict actual alcohol consumption a full year later.

20. Why Smoke?Handout 11 or above is significant • Stimulation (A,G,M scores), a lift, awaken • Handling (B,H,N scores) the touch and feel • Pleasure, relaxation (C,I,O scores) • Reduce negative feelings (D,J,P scores), relieve stress • Craving: psychological and physical addiction (E,K, Q scores) • Habit (F,L,R scores) no longer receive gratification

21. Caffeine • Most popular and ancient drug • Occurs naturally in more than 60 plants and trees • Stimulate certain neurotransmitters in the CNS • Can temporarily increase heart rate, metabolism, and stomach acid secretion • Dilates some blood vessels, constricts others • Can produce trembling, chronic muscle tension, throbbing headaches, depression, insomnia • May adversely affect those with hypertension. • May cause bone loss in postmenopausal women who have a low intake of calcium

22. Caffeine Caffeine poses health risks only for certain susceptible people: • People who experience palpitations • Women who regularly consume more than 300 mg of caffeine daily may reduce their chances of becoming pregnant and increase their chances of having a miscarriage or delivering an underweight baby. • Can trigger heartburn in some people and aggravate an existing ulcer. • Some research suggests that people who suffer from anxiety problems tend to feel better when off caffeine.

23. Marijuana – Is it good medicine? • Arizona and California – first to allow marijuana for medical purposes • Several people have won the right to take it for their symptoms • More research is being done • The 1999 National Academy of Sciences report did not support claims that marijuana is helpful in combating glaucoma, migraine headaches, and movement disorders such as Parkinson’s disease.

24. Marijuana as Medicine? • One problem is that patients must inhale harmful smoke. • marijuana is used illicitly by many AIDS sufferers who rely on it to control their symptoms. • What are the arguments against its legalization, at least for medical purposes? • Federal government officials fear that any sanctioned use would lead to liberalization of drug laws, which could lead to increased drug use. Others argue that newer drugs and therapies do what marijuana once did particularly for nausea from chemotherapy

25. The First Acid Trip,1943Chemist Albert Hofmann, Creator of LSD “Last Friday, April 16, 1943, I was forced to stop my work in the laboratory in the middle of the afternoon and to go home, as I was seized by a particular restlessness associated with a sensation of mild dizziness. On arriving home, I lay down and sank into a kind of drunkenness which was not unpleasant and which was characterized by extreme activity of imagination. As I lay in a dazed condition with my eyes closed (I experienced daylight as disagreeably bright) there surged upon me an uninterrupted stream of fantastic images of extraordinary plasticity and vividness and accompanied by an intense kaleidoscope-like play of colors. The condition gradually passed off after two hours.”

26. LSD – Basic Information • Variously called acid, sugar, big D, trips, or micro-dots, LSD is an extremely potent hallucinogen. • The average dosage that will produce changes in consciousness, or what are called psychomimetic effects, is approximately 0.5–1.0 micrograms of LSD per kilogram of body weight. So if you weigh 150 pounds, 1/20,000 of a gram will have an effect. Even more remarkable is that if such a dosage is taken orally, only about 1 percent of it will ever reach the brain. • Although the use of LSD probably does not produce either physical or psychological dependency, the user does develop a tolerance for the drug very quickly.

27. LSD - Problems • disrupts the balance between intuition and analytic reasoning that is required for genuine creation. • affects motor abilities, preventing the user from communicating new insights. • produces elevated heart rate, body temperature, and blood pressure, and faster, more erratic breathing. • “bad trips,” can be harrowing and traumatic. Hallucinations, even of one’s own body image, can be grotesque and threatening. • People may feel completely out of control or believe they can fly, walk on water, or perform some other amazing feat. There may be a feeling of paranoia and fear not only of strangers but also of friends and relatives. Depression and acute anxiety may lead to dangerous acts, the most extreme being suicide.

28. LSD - Problems • A small minority continue to experience mental confusion, perceptual distortions, and poor concentration for days after the experience. • In very rare cases, individuals have complained of disturbances years after being exposed to LSD. • Some experience “flashbacks”—spontaneous, involuntary recurrences of perceptual distortions—months later. These are reportedly every bit as vivid as those experienced during the original trip. Unprepared for this recurrence, people may react with fear, anxiety, and, in some cases, psychotic behavior.