Understanding Drug Use and Abuse

Benjamin P. Bowser is Professor Emeritus of Sociology at California State University East Bay, USA. Carl O. Word is Professor of Clinical Psychology at Argosy University, USA. Toby Seddon is Professor of Law and Director of Research in the School of Law at the University of Manchester, UK.

Understanding Drug Use and Abuse: A Global Perspective is an ambitious text that covers a lot of pertinent issues ranging from the historical development of drug policy to the physiology of drug use … Understanding Drug Use and Abuse is definitely a student text that explains many of the taken-for-granted assumptions often evident in other books on drugs … The book is well written and is a good text for both students and academics alike.

• PART I: INTRODUCTION1. Substance Abuse: a Growing Social Problem2. Scope of the Issue: Prevalence of Drug Abuse3. Prohibition of Alcohol and Opiates4. Social Marketing PerspectivePART II: THEORETICAL PERSPECTIVES5. Sociological Perspectives6. Criminological Perspectives7. Psychological Perspectives8. Physiological PerspectivesPART III: RESPONSES9. Public Policy: Criminal Justice Responses10. Public Policy: Public Health Responses11. Prevention12. TreatmentPART IV: CONCLUSION13. Recommendations and Afterthoughts.