Well I don’t have much progress in anything except I am doing some general research and trying to find my second expert. I think I am going to wait until I meet my expert next week to figure out what exactly my goal is.
So I got this book to learn more about alcohol and drugs and its pretty cool. The book has alot of information that isn’t biased…tells how the substance goes through your body and how your body reacts to it. This book is called Buzzed by Cynthia Kuhn, PhD, Scott Swartzwelder, PhD, and Wilikie Wilson, PhD of the Duke University Medical Center. I figured that if I am doing a project on addiction, I might as well get to know alot of the substances that people are addicted to in our society. I’m currently in Part I and finished reading about caffeine and alcohol, and now I’m on the ecstasy chapter. Found a really interesting fact in the alcohol section: “Recent studies suggest that young people may respond quite differently from adults to alcohol. Although the research is still developing, it looks like alcohol may impair learning more in adolescents, but be less potent at making them sleepy…” (pg. 34). So there is a unique risk to adolescents who are addicted to alcohol, which makes sense because adolscent’s brains are not as developed. I don’t know if this has much to do with my project, but I just thought it was interesting.
Also found another interesting fact on a website that has a compliation of articles:
“According to the Institute of Medicine of the National Academy of Science, 32 percent of people who try tobacco become dependent, as do 23 percent of those who try heroin, 17 percent who try cocaine, 15 percent who try alcohol and 9 percent who try marijuana.” http://www.medrants.com/archives/1500
So maybe there is something that is triggered in the brain when someone that has never used before tries a substance and they get addicted…maybe it is different for different people? Maybe it is different for people who need an escape, or believe they do, and when they try a drug it makes them relieved of their certain problems while they are high.
“Every addictive substance, according to a report this month in The New England Journal of Medicine, induces pleasant states or relieves distress.” http://www.medrants.com/archives/1500
This statistic says to me, that a high or pleasant state is the main reason that people become addicted…but I am not going to conclude anything until I get all the information that I feel that I need.
Thank you. You are right on track. You think you have not done much but you have. Keep digging – it will get more and more interesting and you will learn things that will change your life and the one’s around you as well.