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The discipline of epidemiology utilizes the constructs of agent, host, vector, and environment to study the incidence and prevalence (i.e., the nature, extent, distribution, correlates) and the contexts, and consequences of drug abuse in the United States. This paper provides a selected review of the results of 40 years of epidemiological study of drug abuse using surveillance systems, general population surveys, ethnography and qualitative research approaches. It then addresses the challenges in conducting research on drug abuse epidemiology. The paper concludes with some missed opportunities and lessons learned in four decades of a large portfolio of research studies conducted by an impressive array of distinguished scientists. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We present findings from a qualitative study of 80 women and men who sold Ecstasy in private settings. In this paper we explore Ecstasy sellers' identity processes and pathways to dealing. Interviewees believed "real dealers" sold in public settings to people they did not know and relied on drug sales as their main source of income. We found that 76% of the sample resisted the dealer identity due to the stigma associated with dealing, Ecstasy's benign reputation, selling in private settings, and customer bases that comprised mainly friends. The majority of the sample "drifted" into dealing and did not consciously decide to sell. Additionally, most interviewees did not implement precautionary sales strategies that characterize drug dealing operations described in our own and other investigators' research on drug markets. Ecstasy sellers created new, more positive identity constructions for themselves, which is also an important focus of this paper. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The objectives of this paper are to describe ecstasy use patterns among young adult (18-25 years) users and to compare use patterns and self-reported effects according to the frequency (number of days used in the last 90 days) and intensity (typical number of pills taken per sitting) of ecstasy use. Computer-assisted structured interviews were conducted with 261 young adult active ecstasy users in Atlanta, Georgia. A typical dose of ecstasy intake was two pills, often followed by a booster dose. In addition, binging on ecstasy was reported. Ecstasy was mentioned as the primary drug of choice by one fifth of respondents. Poly-drug use dominated, and a substantial proportion of the respondents reported symptoms of ecstasy dependence. Differences in sociodemographic characteristics, poly-drug use, and reported effects of ecstasy use were found according to frequency and intensity of ecstasy use. Findings from this paper are important for the development of effective prevention efforts, including drug treatment and policy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The National Household Survey on Drug Abuse (NHSDA) is the nation's primary data source for information on the scope and dimensions of drug abuse in the United States. To improve data collection, the NHSDA was converted to a computer-assisted interview (CAI) format in 1999. This paper reports on the research that was done to guide the conversion. The main focus of the paper is on a large (n=1,982) field experiment that examined different audio computer-assisted self-interviewing (ACASI) procedures in the fourth quarter of 1997. This field experiment showed that ACASI is likely to increase reporting of drug use among youth; that respondents can, on their own, correct inconsistencies in responses that are detected by the computer; and that ACASI eases the response task for poor readers and less well educated respondents. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines the drug policy priorities of the federal government as expressed in the collection of drug strategies produced since 1973. It compares rhetorical emphases with the reported budgeted amounts for Federal programs. The paper finds that, in general, the priorities expressed in the strategies match the relative distribution of supply and demand reduction resources. Recent attempts by the Office of National Drug Control Policy (ONDCP) to increase spending on drug treatment in the 1990s stand out as an exception, however. The factors accounting for the difficulty ONDCP encounters in realizing its budget goals include (1) the cross-cutting nature of the drug budget. (2) the fact that earlier legislative decisions "front-loaded" the drug budget with law enforcement programs, and (3) the fragmented nature of the Federal budget process. This paper concludes that if legislators want to hold ONDCP responsible for the outcomes of Federal anti-drug programs, they should provide the Office with discretionary control over marginal resources, an authority the Drug Czar currently does not have. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper examines the impact and possible unintended side effects of the privately sponsored Partnership for a Drug-Free America (PDFA) media campaign to reduce illicit drug abuse. The paper describes the history, goals, organization, production processes, and process and outcome evaluations of the PDFA advertising campaign. It also reviews major criticisms that have been leveled at the PDFA campaign, including its dissemination of false information, the narrow scope of its message, a number of unintended iatrogenic side-effects, potential conflicts of interest arising from the sources of its funding, and the agenda-setting function of the PDFA campaign in defining which drugs are dangerous and how the attendant problems should be addressed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Drug treatment in the United States has been fragmented, underfunded, less than comprehensive, and poorly planned and integrated. To bring about a significant improvement in the number of drug abusers who receive treatment and in the effectiveness of the treatment they receive, the current fragmented approach needs to be replaced with an integrated, coherent system of drug treatment. This paper discusses the characteristics of a drug treatment system and focuses on two elements of such a system: the use of the health care and criminal justice systems as locations to identify persons in need of drug treatment, and matching clients with appropriate services to improve treatment effectiveness. The paper also discusses several issues that will need to be addressed in developing a drug treatment system, offers examples at the federal, state, and local levels indicative of trends in the direction of a systems approach to drug treatment, and emphasizes the importance of federal leadership in systems development. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Domestic production of methamphetamine in small toxic labs (STLs) results in significant community safety and health consequences. This paper examines the effects of state-level policies implemented in the middle of the last decade in reaction to a rapid increase in STL labs. These policies focused on controlling access to the methamphetamine precursor chemicals ephedrine and pseudoephedrine and the relationship of such policies with actual STL seizure rates. Data include (a) primary legal research on state laws/regulations in all 50 states in effect as of October 1, 2005; and (b) STL seizure counts for 2004-2006. Results from random effects cross-sectional time-series regression models showed that states with the greatest reduction in STL seizures had comprehensive policies involving quantity limits on methamphetamine precursor purchases, clerk intervention requirements (such as requiring buyer identifi cation) and regulatory agency specification for monitoring compliance and tracking multiple purchases. Criminalizing purchasing violations was not related to STL reductions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper we examine the potential interdependence between early adolescent alcohol use and later role occupancy of such social roles as higher education attendance, parenthood, level of work intensity, and marriage. Data from a ten-year prospective study (1990-1993 & 2000-2003) were employed to examine these relationships among a sample of 523 young adult males who had previously attended a Miami-Dade County (Florida) middle or high school. Among the adult social roles considered, only being currently married was shown to be a significant predictor of having an inverse association with heavy alcohol use. However, an important conditional relationship was also observed: among those respondents who have a history of high early alcohol use, there is an association between work intensity and heavy alcohol use such that work intensity has a social amplification effect on young adult heavy alcohol use. The results presented here demonstrate that early risk factors need to be considered in conjunction with later social role occupancy when examining young problem drinking. The implications and limitations of these findings are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Despite the importance of the “war on drugs,” little research has examined Americans’ attitudes toward drug-related issues. In particular, the extant literature has not considered period and cohort effects for views about drug control issues, although there are theoretical reasons to expect both to be important. In this paper the roles of period and cohort effects, net of individual-level predictors, for attitudes toward both governmental spending to address drug addiction and legalizing marijuana use were examined. Data from the General Social Surveys (1975 through 2006) were used. The logistic regression results showed variations in attitudes over time for both addiction spending and legalizing marijuana use. Cohort effects were also evident. The results suggest that a liberalization of attitudes, both over time and across cohorts, may be occurring, especially for the legalization of marijuana use. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The main objective of this paper is to investigate potential predictors of drug risk among a community-based sample of individuals who are exposed to illicit drugs. The four domains of interest are individual socio-demographic and social-psychological attributes, current situational circumstances and family-of-origin characteristics. Interviews were conducted with 242 individuals who were recruited in Atlanta, Georgia. Initial descriptive analyses were followed by multivariate analyses. The final model predicted 60% of the variance in drug risk. Current situational circumstances were statistically significant regarding drug risk. Family-of-origin characteristics also were significant, even when entered into the predictive model after current situational circumstances. In addition to individual social-psychological characteristics such as depression and self-esteem, the impact of childhood emotional abuse is noted. The findings indicate a need for considering proximal as well as more distal influences on drug risk behavior when designing drug use prevention and intervention programs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The 1996 U.S. presidential campaign represents an unusual and important case for research on the social construction of drug problems. Presidential candidate Robert Dole and other prominent politicians made dramatic claims about a growing teenage "drug crisis" based on supportive evidence from severe/national surveys. However, these claims were often ignored and even criticized by the news media. This paper examines how and why journalists responded so differently to this putative crisis than they did to earlier drug crises, such as the media "feeding frenzy" about crack cocaine in the 1980s. An analysis of news stories, political statements, and editorial commentary that appeared in major news outlets during 1995 and 1996 reveals a number of tactics that media workers employed to deconstruct politicians' claims and to frame the drug issue as an election-year strategy rather than as an authentic crisis. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The purpose of this paper is to describe cross-national differences in drug use and violence among three sites that vary in social and political culture and drug use policies--Philadelphia, Toronto, and Amsterdam. The DAVI (Drugs, Alcohol and Violence International) study is based on personal interviews with 1,120 adolescents aged 14 to 17 years from three sites and two samples (550 detainees and 570 dropouts). Seven drug use outcomes and three violence outcomes were compared across sites. We found that site differences were dominant. Only two of 10 outcomes (cannabis onset and relative drug-related violence) were not significantly related to site as a main effect or through an interaction. The most common site differences showed that the Toronto samples reported higher rates of drug use than Philadelphia and Amsterdam. Our findings indicate that drug taking behavior transcends geopolitical boundaries and that there is no clear evidence that rates of drug use are related to policy climate. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

While there is a plethora of literature on program models, evaluation strategies, evaluation outcomes, and lessons learned regarding anti-alcohol and drug community coalitions, case studies of implementation are rare. This paper analyzes multiple case histories of implementation of the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation's (RWJF) "Fighting Back" (FB) program with particular attention to issues in multiethnic sites. A common theme in the case histories was minority challenge to the legitimacy of local grantees' (lead agency) leadership in addressing local alcohol and other drug (AOD) problems facing minorities. The local projects adopted a range of strategies to increase their legitimacy with minorities: sharing policy making with or turning it over to minority leadership, recruiting minorities for positions on staff and committees, and subcontracting or making grants to minority-run organizations to implement project activities. These responses reduced challenges to the local projects' legitimacy but also produced unanticipated consequences; most significantly, the nature of project activity expanded well beyond the original scope of FB's mission to reduce demand for AOD. The discussion addresses the implications of legitimacy issues related to political control of FB, allocation of the grant's resources, and how AOD problems and solutions were framed in the context of urban multiethnic U.S. settings. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Illegal drug use remains one of the United States' most serious health problems, and the "War on Drugs" continues without an end in sight. Antidrug programs, which offer the potential to reduce substance abuse problems, are a component of efforts to deal with the problem, but they operate absent adequate scientific analysis. Although policy has shifted from a focus on supply control to one that includes prevention and treatment, research and theory lag behind program implementation. Thus, for example, community-based programs designed to change norms and systems of substance use have been widely promoted despite the lack of data to support their use. The present paper summarizes findings from an evaluation of a large national demonstration program, "Fighting Back." Results of the evaluation of broad-based community initiatives in a dozen communities show that the programs failed to reduce rates of substance use and associated harms. These findings, along with other evidence, place reliance on community-based programs at odds with public rhetoric. To deal more effectively with substance abuse, there is a need to move from "grading" programs to understanding why and how interventions function. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Although testing for alcohol and drug use is common in the U.S. workplace, relatively little is known about the characteristics of workplaces that test and about the consequences to persons tested, This paper describes the link between drug and alcohol testing and the minority composition of worksites. The data come from a 1999 survey of 264 union officials in the telecommunications industry. These preliminary data suggest minority worksites were more likely to perform pre-employment and just-cause testing and less likely to perform random drug testing, even after considering workplace characteristics such as normative use of drugs. A similar but weaker association was found for alcohol testing. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Measuring the success of Alternative Development (AD) programs by the number of illicit crop hectares eradicated puts AD in an undesirable competition with aerial fumigation, which can reduce these areas in a much shorter time. Whereas AD can only obtain results over the long term, the political push to demonstrate immediate successful results has led to an imbalance in United States anti-drug aid, which is strongly weighted towards aerial fumigation. Despite the short-term success of aerial spraying, the key question of the political, social, and economic sustainability of the results obtained through the use of forceful eradication remains open. AD policies have suffered from changes in their focus over time. Today they are fixated on the idea that the sole purpose of illicit crops is to finance terrorist groups. This conception of the policy issue results in the use of force -- specifically, aerial fumigations using chemicals -- as the foundation for decision making. This single criterion, therefore, affects programs that once recognized the social and economic roots of the problem of illicit crops. This paper seeks to examine and question those aspects of the current strategy and to explore alternative strategies of eradication that take into account who makes decisions in this matter and on whose behalf said alternatives establish oversight for the ongoing advancement in drug policy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The purpose of this paper is to characterize persons who sniff heroin by examining their experiences prior to first heroin use, experiences at first use, current drug use patterns, and factors associated with progression to the daily use of heroin. Relatively little has been published about the lives and career trajectories of heroin sniffers who have little or no history of drug injection. A sample of 250 African-American, Hispanic/Latino, and non-Hispanic White men and women who sniffed heroin were interviewed for this study. Most people first sniffed heroin in a social setting where heroin use was not preplanned. Heroin sniffing has become a sustained pattern of use for many of these users; the majority have progressed to daily sniffing of heroin and are polydrug users for whom crack is an important substance; and heroin sniffers have experienced a range of life and health problems including a high prevalence of HIV. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper evaluates the relationships among federal anti-drug law enforcement expenditures, education and treatment expenditures, and public health outcomes. The data include four types of spending: criminal justice system, interdiction and international intelligence, education in the community and workplace, and drug treatment. These data were combined with mortality rates for drug abuse, a public health outcome. The empirical findings support the hypothesis that resources allocated to drug prevention and treatment have benefited the public health. Conversely, a 10% reduction in enforcement expenditures is associated with a long-run reduction of approximately 3,000 deaths per year. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Inmates with a history of opiate dependence represent a substantial proportion of the correctional population in the United States. Opiate use has negative consequences for both the inmate and society, including increased recidivism rates, increased infectious disease prevalence, avoidable emergency room use, decreased access to primary care services, and overdose. While there have been great successes in community-based treatment of opiate' dependence, these successes have not yet been achieved in correctional settings. This paper reviews the pharmacological treatment options for opiate-dependent inmates, along with potential application for community-to-correctional approaches. The recent approval by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) of physician-prescribed buprenorphine and the new opportunities it presents to' corrections-based treatment are also explored in depth. Successful implementation of such strategies is likely to result in desirable health and social outcomes for both the inmate and the community at large. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Since the 1990s, marijuana has been the drug of choice among American youths, especially those that tend to sustain arrests. Previous birth cohorts had greater use of crack, powder cocaine, or heroin. This paper summarizes prior research that strongly suggests drug eras tend to follow a regular course. These insights then serve as the basis for projecting trends in marijuana use both for the general population nationwide and for Manhattan arrestees. To the extent that current trends persist, the prospects for the "Marijuana/Blunts Generation" (born 1970 and later) may be relatively good. These young persons may successfully avoid "hard drugs" as well as the attendant health, social, and legal problems for their entire life, but they may experience higher levels of smoking-related ailments. The conclusion presents issues for continued drug surveillance and ethnographic research to more accurately understand the Marijuana/Blunts Era and to provide an indicator of future changes as they occur. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper describes initial findings from a project utilizing unobtrusive participant observation to investigate noncompliance with workplace tobacco control regulations within stand-alone bars in one California city. Early findings indicate that half of the bars in the sample fully complied with the law, while other bars could be described as in transition from smoking to nonsmoking, and a minority of bars remained consistently noncompliant. No smoking at all was observed in 50.4% of bars. Of the 49.6% of bars in which smoking was observed at least once, 14.9% were characterized by endemic smoking. Nine percent of smoking bars may have converted from smoking to nonsmoking over the course of the study, and the remaining bars were characterized by incidental smoking (including doorway smoking, lone smokers, and closing time smoking). Implications for enhancing compliance with tobacco control policies are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper uses longitudinal data on nearly 500 minority mothers living in an inner-city neighborhood of Chicago to study the role of illicit drugs as a potential barrier to economic self-sufficiency. The analysis employs information collected during the last trimester of pregnancy and one year after the birth of the child. Logit regressions that control for a rich set of human capital and demographic characteristics reveal that illicit drug use in the months before the pregnancy is associated with a large increase in the likelihood of welfare reliance one year later. Other models, focusing on a drug addiction problem as measured by very frequent drug use before the pregnancy or any use during the pregnancy, yield even more pronounced effects, a result that is robust to a different specification that treats this variable as endogenous. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The conventional wisdom among the law enforcement community is that drug use causes crime and that stringent enforcement of drug laws is an effective tool to combat property and violent crime. Previous research by some of these authors found that a sharp increase in drug enforcement in Florida during 1984–1989 resulted in a reallocation of police resources which reduced the effectiveness of property crime enforcement and increased the property crime rate. Some have suspected that this result is the product of the very large increase in drug enforcement during this time period and that under “normal” circumstances greater drug enforcement would not result in higher property crime. This paper rebuts that suspicion. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The aim of this paper is to evaluate the effectiveness of an intervention to deter underage alcohol sales by targeting alcohol retailers instead of underage youth. A quasi-experiment using a repeated-intervention design was conducted for a random sample (n=143) of off-sale alcohol outlets from across New Orleans. Compliance checks of off-sale outlets were conducted at baseline, two months after the intervention, and eight months after the intervention. At baseline, only 11.2% (16⁄ 143) of outlets were compliant. Following the intervention, compliance increased to 39. 9% (p<.001). The increase in compliance was greatest among outlets receiving citations for non compliance (23⁄45, 51.1%; p<.001); however, a significant increase in compliance (34⁄98, 34.7%; p<.001) was also observed among outlets that did not receive a citation but were only exposed to the media coverage of the issuing of citations. A small residual effect of the intervention persisted at eight months post intervention among the outlets receiving citations for non-compliance. The study demonstrates that a deterrence strategy composed of compliance checks and the threat of compliance checks was effective in increasing alcohol retailer compliance with the minimum legal drinking age law. Given the limited effectiveness of general deterrence strategies in targeting other illegal alcohol use behaviors, these findings suggest general deterrence strategies are less effective when the behavior targeted is influenced by physiologic and social externalities, as is the case for underage alcohol consumers, rather than by costs, and benefits, as is the case for alcohol retailers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Although justifications for a more restrictive U.S. immigration policy have increasingly relied on linking socially unacceptable behaviors such as welfare participation and illicit drug use with illegal entry, very few immigration impact studies separate respondents by foreign-born legal status. Applying a legal status prediction equation to 1994-1996 CALDUF data, this paper (1) estimates the relative level of illicit drug use (lU) among unauthorized Latino immigrant arrestees (ULIAs) in California and (2) investigates how individual-demographic and institutional-structural factors influence lU. ULIAs were underrepresented, with a smaller proportion testing positive for lU and having experienced or desired drug treatment. Regression results suggest (1) ULIA status had an independent negative effect on lU; and (2) higher earnings may have decreased, and public assistance recipiency and the percent of one's income obtained illegally may have increased, the likelihood of lU. We conclude by discussing implications for various policy instruments. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

"Reefer madness," a spurious psychiatric affliction that was widely promulgated in the United States during the 1930s, is rarely mentioned today as a possible sequela of acute cannabis consumption. Because reefer madness (RM) was questioned and generally dismissed in the West by the 1940s, I was surprised to find that it was still widely accepted as a genuine psycho-pharmacological affliction in the Eastern Caribbean country of St. Vincent and the Grenadines in the 1990s. This paper describes and analyzes the reasons for this discontinuity between the West and the Rest by referring to the multiplicity of factors supporting the Vincentian RM syndrome: a generalized tropical "intellectual backwardness" and associated moral apathy; the real and alleged behavioral-psychological effects of acute cannabis ingestion; the peculiarly Caribbean character of Vincentian RM and the way it differs from its American counterpart; the types of people promoting the affliction; the larger anti-marijuana context that includes opposition to any involvement with the substance; and, most importantly, the national system of racial and class stratification. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

During the 1980s, many urban areas in the United States experienced a widespread expansion in the use of drugs in general and crack cocaine in particular. This expansion of crack use is thought to have resulted in various behavioral changes, e.g., an increase in crime and an increase in expenditures to reduce drug use. This paper examines how local police spending responded to the spread of crack cocaine. We use a pooled cross-section, time series data set consisting of 18 cities over the period 1982 through 1989 to estimate the impact of crack cocaine use on police spending, and find that police expenditures increased significantly as crack cocaine use rose. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Economics can be used to analyze public sector decision making because individuals make these decisions within a framework of incentives and constraints that are a product of individual preferences and institutional structure. Considering the emphasis on law enforcement in U.S. drug policy in this context, this paper presents an analysis of the incentives and constraints affecting drug policy that explains a reluctance to change the policy even in the face of considerable evidence that some reforms could be cost effective. Two specific incentives for an emphasis on enforcement are presented. First, police agencies have an incentive to allocate more resources to drug enforcement due to the factors that determine police budgets. Second, asset forfeiture laws give police agencies a direct monetary reward for making drug arrests. We conclude that understanding drug policy requires an examination of the incentives and constraints that affect the behavior of those who are responsible for policy development. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The purpose of this paper is to examine differences in patterns and consequences of narcotics use among Hispanic and white addicts over time. Data were gathered from admission records and from interviews conducted in 1974-75 and 1985-86 from 323 Hispanic and 212 white narcotics addicts admitted to the California Civil Addict Program in 1962 to 1964. Analyses compared the two groups on narcotics use, incarceration, mortality, and other characteristics at each follow-up point and in terms of drug-use status. Compared with white addicts, Hispanic addicts showed a progression of more persistent and severe narcotics addiction. At each interview point, Hispanics were more likely than whites to be using opiates or to be incarcerated. Comparisons of opiate use at the two interview points showed that Hispanics were less likely than whites to remain abstinent and were more likely to relapse to opiate use. Overall, Hispanics also had greater involvement in the criminal justice system, higher rates of cocaine use, and a higher proportion of deaths due to violence and accidents. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper presents preliminary outcomes of a community-based AIDS prevention program for drug users called Project COPE II, the National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA) cooperative agreement study in Hartford, Connecticut. COPE II's efficacy study compares the NIDA standard intervention against two culturally targeted, enhanced interventions, one for African Americans and one for Puerto Ricans. A sample of 188 out-of-treatment injection drug users (IDUs) with matched baseline and 6-month follow-up interviews were compared for changes in monthly injection rates and proportionate use of new and pre-used needles and used injection supplies. Effects of injection outliers, attrition, and ethnic differences were examined for impact on outcome measures and to identify subgroups within the study population for whom the intervention had differential effects. These preliminary analyses suggest that attendance in culturally targeted enhanced interventions may increase the likelihood of positive program outcome, including drug-related risk reduction for some populations. However, subgroups of IDUs, such as extremely high injectors or individuals who drop out before initiating or completing the program, may require different intervention approaches. Further research is needed to understand the relationship between intervention and behavior change, reasons for attrition, and moderating factors affecting project outcomes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The St. Louis EachOneTeachOne (EOTO) project is a National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA)-funded cooperative agreement aimed at examining rates of HIV risk behaviors and studying HIV risk reduction interventions among out-of-treatment injection and crack cocaine drug users. This paper uses data collected during the first year of recruitment and enrollment to document the effect of street outreach on HIV risk behavior involvement. The major findings are that: (1) men reported more HIV risk behaviors than did women, but the results failed to show striking racial or ethnic differences; (2) we successfully enrolled women in spite of the fact that our women street contacts were largely ineligible to enroll in EOTO; and (3) actual EOTO enrollees, compared with all street contacts and eligible street contacts, engaged in fewer HIV risk behaviors. These results imply that strategies in addition to street outreach may be needed to enlist more individuals, particularly whites and women who are engaging in the highest risk drug and sexual behaviors. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The social contexts in which individuals drink and the expected outcomes of that drinking (i.e., individual beliefs about the effects of drinking beverage alcohol) have recently been found to represent conceptually distinct models of alcohol consumption patterns. This paper examines the relationships between contexts, beliefs, and a variety of problem drinking patterns, and reestimates these relationships in a large national probability sample of 2,100 adults (U.S. National Alcohol Survey [National 7], Alcohol Research Group 1984: Berkeley, Calif.). Regression analyses indicate that the interrelationship of drinking contexts and drinking beliefs, and their impact on drinking behavior, is more complex than previously described. Consistent with earlier research, when simple frequency of drinking is the focus, social contexts for drinking emerge as the more important independent influences. When several indicators of maladaptive drinking are considered, however, beliefs regarding the effects of drinking, particularly beliefs regarding drinking as a means to modify affect, are found to be more influential. Logic is developed for a comprehensive model of the sources of problem drinking that incorporates both classes of explanatory variables. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In light of the failure of the War on Drugs, the Bush administration is trying to implement new policies to reduce supply and demand of cocaine. Using published information and fieldwork data on Peru, the largest cocaine-producing country, this paper argues that the boom of cocaine production is the result of North-South politicoeconomic relations. In order to wean the Andean peasants from their dependence on the illicit cocaine economy, a comprehensive economic development in the national periphery is necessary. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]