Reaction Paper Psychopathology Assignment II

Maanya dua (A0403423043)

MACLP Sec. G
Amity Institute of Psychology and Allied Sciences
PSYC627:Psychopathology - II
Dr. Somya Khatri February 25th, 2024
 Reaction paper

Drug addiction, also called substance use disorder, is a disease that affects
a person's brain and behavior and leads to an inability to control the use
of a legal or illegal drug or medicine. Substances such as alcohol,
marijuana and nicotine also are considered drugs. When you're addicted,
you may continue using the drug despite the harm it causes. In other
words, SUDs occur when an individual compulsively misuses drugs or
alcohol and continues abusing the substance despite knowing the
negative impact it has on their life. SUDs may range from mild to severe,
with severity depending on the number of diagnostic criteria a person
meets. When someone is diagnosed with mild SUD, this means a person
displays 2-3 symptoms, moderate means they display 4-5 symptoms, and
severe means they display 6 or more

It is found to be greatest in individuals ages 18–25, with a higher

likelihood occurring in men compared to women, and urban residents
compared to rural residents. Substance-induced disorders include medical
conditions that can be directly attributed to the use of a substance. These
conditions include intoxication, withdrawal, substance-induced delirium,
substance-induced psychosis, and substance-induced mood disorders
A research study on teens overdosing and approaches to combat
substance misuse by ZARA ABRAMS (1st MARCH 2024) gives an insight
about today’s youth and there unstoppable addiction towards substances
and holistic programs to help steer kids away or at least keep them from
dying from illicit substances.

Abstract

Substance use among teenagers has become a major social issue in recent
years, and we must understand more about how drug abuse affects
academic performance. Drug addiction can lead to poor grades, low self-
esteem, memory challenges, attention deficits, and poor social skills.
More teens than ever are overdosing,In this paper Psychologists are
leading new approaches to combat youth substance misuse

Keywords
Substance use , Abuse , and Addiction, teens , drugs , substance use
disorder .

Introduction

Drugs cannot be this taboo thing that young people can’t ask about
anymore,” said Nina Christie, PhD, a postdoctoral research fellow in the
Centre on Alcohol, Substance Use, and Addictions at the University of
New Mexico. “That’s just a recipe for young people dying, and we can’t
continue to allow that.” For years, students in middle and high schools
across the country were urged to “just say no” to drugs and alcohol. But
it’s no secret that the Drug Abuse Resistance Education (D.A.R.E.)
program, which was typically delivered by police officers who urged total
abstinence, didn’t work. A meta-analysis found the program largely
ineffective and one study even showed that kids who completed D.A.R.E.
were more likely than their peers to take drugs“There are real and
perceived benefits to using drugs, as well as risks, such as coping with
stress or liking the ‘high.’ If we only talk about the negatives, we lose our
credibility.” Aside from vaping, adolescent use of illicit substances has
dropped substantially over the past few decades, but more teens are
overdosing than ever largely because of contamination of the drug supply
with fentanyl, as well as the availability of stronger substancesThe goal is
to impress upon youth that far and away the healthiest choice is not to
put these substances in your body, while at the same time acknowledging
that some kids are still going to try them,” said Aaron Weiner, PhD, ABPP,
a licensed clinical psychologist based in Lake Forest, Illinois, and
immediate past-president of APA’s Division 50 (Society of Addiction
Psychology).

Research methodology

The approaches this paper used are in my opinion are observation and
medical analysis and surveys on high school seniors, 1 in 5 sophomores,
and 1 in 10 eighth graders reported using an illicit substance in the past
year, according to the National Institute on Drug Abuse’s (NIDA) annual
survey, Monitoring the Future: National Survey Results on Drug Use,
1975–2022: Secondary School Students, NIDA, 2023 . in 2022, five
Alabama high school students overdosed on a substance laced with
fentanyl.The paper doesn’t provide brief detailing on how and from where
the data has been collected or the tools that were used to conduct this
study.

Results and discussion

Archaeological records indicate the presence of psychotropic plants and
drug use in ancient civilisations as far back as early hominid species about
200 million years ago. Roughly 13,000 years ago, the inhabitants of Timor
commonly used betel nut (Areca catechu), as did those in Thailand around
10,700 years ago. the drug has had a wide use in indigenous medicines,
and to some extent in modern medicine . The American Medical
Association (AMA) classified alcoholism as a disease in 1956 and included
addiction as a disease in 1987. In 2011 the American Society of Addiction
Medicine (ASAM) joined the AMA, defining addiction as a chronic brain
disorder, not a behavior problem, or just the result of making bad choices
More than 81.2% drug users have experience of first time drug intake
before they reach 20 years. More than 32% of drug users took drug first
time in their life as early as 15 years
Substance use during adolescence is particularly dangerous because
psychoactive substances, including nicotine, cannabis, and alcohol, can
interfere with healthy brain development. Young people who use
substances early and frequently also face a higher risk of developing a
substance use disorder in adulthood. Alcohol and cocaine are less popular
than they were in the 1990s; use of cannabis and hallucinogens, which
are now more salient and easier to obtain, were higher than ever among
young adults in 2021 Young people are also seeing and sharing content
about substance use on social media, with a rise in posts and influencers
promoting vaping on TikTok and other platform Research suggests that
adolescents and young adults who see tobacco or nicotine content on
social media are more likely to later start using it
“Gen Z is drinking less alcohol than previous generations, but they seem
to be increasingly interested in psychedelics and cannabis,” Christie said.
“Those substances have kind of replaced alcohol as the cool thing to be
doing.” A key tenet of modern prevention and treatment programs is
empowering youth to make their own decisions around substance use in a
developmentally appropriate way

Conclusion
Concern for youth well-being is what drove the well-intentioned, but
ultimately ineffective, “mad rush for abstinenceAdolescents are exploring
their identities (including how they personally relate to drugs), learning
how to weigh the consequences of their actions, and preparing for
adulthood, which involves making choices about their future. The Seven
Challenges Program, for example, uses supportive journaling exercises,
combined with counseling, to help young people practice informed
decision--making around substance use with those processes in mind

Today’s prevention efforts also tend to be more holistic than their

predecessors, accounting for the ways drug use relates to other addictive
behaviors, such as gaming and gambling, or risky choices, such as fighting,
drag racing, and having unprotected sex. Risk factors for substance use—
which include trauma, adverse childhood experiences, parental history of
substance misuse, and personality factors such as impulsivity and
sensation seeking—overlap with many of those behaviors, so it often
makes sense to address them collectively
 Modern prevention programs also acknowledge that young people use
substances to serve a purpose—typically either social or emotional in
nature—and if adults expect them not to use, they should help teens
learn to fulfill those needs in a different way,

said.
“Youth are generally using substances to gain friends, avoid losing them,
or to cope with emotional problems that they’re having,” he said.
“Effective prevention efforts need to offer healthy alternatives for
achieving those goals.”

Motivating young people

Because substance use and mental health are so intertwined, some
programs can do prevention successfully with very little drug-focused
content. In one of the PreVenture Program’s workshops for teens
PreVenture offers a series of 90-minute workshops that apply cognitive
behavioral insights upstream (addressing the root causes of a potential
issue rather than waiting for symptoms to emerge) to help young people
explore their personality traits and develop healthy coping strategies to
achieve their long-term goals. Adolescents high in impulsivity,
hopelessness, thrill-seeking, or anxiety sensitivity face higher risks of
mental health difficulties and substance use, so the personalized material
helps them practice healthy coping based on their personality type.
 References

• https://www.apa.org/monitor/2024/03/new-approaches-
youth-substance-misuse
• https://greenhillrecovery.com/
• https://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/drug-
addiction/symptoms-causes/syc-20365112
• https://www.psychiatry.org/file%20library/psychiatrists/pra
ctice/dsm/apa_dsm-5-substance-use-disorder.pdf