What makes an addict?

Why some people become addicts where others don’t.

Once a young marine-engineer, a non-smoker, ambitiously said he would one day smoke cigars because a cigar would look very stylish on him.Auntie Rejoice, a middle-aged friend from the U.S. said “I don’t want to get addicted to anything except God’s love.”

I personally do not want to get addicted to anything - not even to coffee. If I want to enjoy the flavour of coffee at all, I usually take a cup of it, if I have not had one the previous day. And that is to keep myself from getting addicted.So, we each seem to have our own idea of addiction, drug abuse and everything.

But, what might make a marine engineer, for example, more likely than a middle-aged American to use - or abuse - alcohol, cigar or a drug?

Predisposition

Many genetic, social and psychological factors have been found to predispose a person to addiction.Recent genetic studies have only supported the idea that some people are genetically predisposed to get addicted to substances. According to one study, for example, sons of male alcoholics show more sensitivity to reinforcing aspects of alcohol. We deduce from another study that the genetic influence on persistent smoking is different from the genetic influence on initiating smoking. And according to a similar study, the magnitude of genetic influence on lifetime smoking appears to be consistent across different countries.

Many social factors play a key role in young people’s smoking, taking alcohol or drugs. Factors that influence illicit drug use include drug availability, significant others’ labelling of the person as deviant, peer influence, early childhood deviance, poor school adjustment and weak family influence.

If a person in his/her early teenage lacks family control, closeness of mother and communication with parents, there is a high likelihood that the person will drink, smoke or take drugs. A number of such factors, in fact, are also said to make a person more likely to sell drugs. Many substance abusers exhibit a history of antisocial behaviour and a high level of depression or low self-esteem.Religion also plays an important role in keeping a person from using or abusing alcohol.

People in all religious denominations use lesser alcohol than non-religious people do, with those in denominations traditionally opposed to alcohol using it less. Of those who drink, religious people abuse alcohol less than do non-religious people do.

Exposure

One major factor underlying abuse of both licit and illicit substances is exposure to licit substances. In other words, people tend to start off with acceptable substances - like alcohol and tobacco - and later fall prey to more evil substances. In North American culture, for example, it is rare for a person to start using hard liquor, marijuana, or other illicit substances without first using tobacco or beer. It is also believed, indeed, that drug involvement in taking drugs in North American and similar cultures in the recent decades has followed a predictable pattern.

Also, once drug taking has begun, a number of physiological and reinforcing factors enter the equation. Reinforcing effects of a drug, which shortly follow drug taking, set off a psychological phenomenon called “operant conditioning”, which leads to drug seeking and further drug taking. Later, the person’s negative mood state or the environmental context in which he/she takes drugs can come to serve as environmental cues, which will further increase the desire to engage in drug-taking behaviour.