bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Artikel
Authors: Hakkarainen Pekka , Metso Leena
Published: December 2017

■ Aims

This article reports the results of a population survey in autumn 2004. First, trends in drug use are studied by comparing the 2004 data with materials collected in the same way in 1992, 1996, 1998 and 2002. Secondly, the relationship between drug use and alcohol consumption is discussed. This latter aspect is of special interest in Finland today following the changes in the alcohol environment in spring 2004 (tax cuts on alcohol, the discontinuation of the import quota within the EU and from Estonia). If alcohol consumption increases, the question is will that have the effect of driving up the consumption of other substances (addition hypothesis) or on the contrary, will drug use decrease and be substituted by increased alcohol consumption (substitution hypothesis)?

■ Methods

The data for the research were collected in a postal questionnaire in autumn 2004. A random sample of 3992 persons aged 15–69 was drawn from the central population register. A total of 2526 persons responded, giving a response rate of 63 per cent. In order to gain a clearer picture of the relationship between drug use and alcohol consumption, we have linked the data for 1998, 2002 and 2004 into one dataset comprising more than 7 000 respondents.

■ Results

The tendency for drug use and experimenting to increase has slowed down since the turn of the millennium. The increase in alcohol sales and tourist imports is not driving up the level of drug use. However, this study lends support to the observations by Juha Partanen (Wet high (1994)) about the close links between drug use and alcohol consumption. In the urban life-styles of younger people the use of cannabis is interwoven with frequent clubbing and party-style drinking patterns. Another indication of the intertwining of drug and alcohol cultures is found in the group of mixed users, who not only drink heavily but also use various drugs and medicines. It would seem that the risk of drug use is increased by the early onset of binge drinking.

■ Conclusion

There is as yet not enough evidence to confirm the addition hypothesis. However, given the close links of drug use with alcohol consumption, it certainly is a possibility that if alcohol consumption sharply increases, this might trigger an increase in drug use and experimenting, particularly among young people. The substitution hypothesis, on the other hand, does not seem very likely. On the contrary, it seems that drug use in Finland ties in rather closely with drinking to intoxication.
Artikel
Authors: Skogens Lisa
Published: December 2017

■ Aims

The aim was to study the influence of personal factors on how social workers act on signs of drinking problems in clients contacting social services for social assistance.

■ Methods & Data

The 103 social workers taking part in the study were, through written vignettes, presented to a hypothetical client in eight fictious consecutive visits to the social service office. During the earlier visits the client shows minor signs that may be interpreted as signs of a drinking problem. In each subsequent visit his drinking problems gradually become more obvious. Following each visit, the social worker was asked to choose among alternatives regarding appropriate actions. The relation between individual qualities amongst the social workers – in terms of age, sex, education, professional experience, views on the nature of problem drinking and principals for resource allocation - and the way they acted (in terms of the acting alternatives they chose at each “visit”) were tested in bivariate and multivariate analyses.

■ Results

Social workers with long professional experience tended to inform the client earlier on available help for problem drinking than did other social workers. Demands for clients to take part in some form of treatment in order to get social assistance were made to a higher extent by social workers without a BA in social work. How the social worker looked on principals for resource allocation also affected the tendency to put that demand on the client.

■ Conclusions

The difference between active and more reluctant social workers could only to some extent be explained by the personal factors investigated. However, the findings may suggest that besides education and professional experience, personal values may play a role.
Artikel
Authors: Warpenius Katariina
Published: December 2017

An actor-assisted purchase experiment was conducted as part of the Local Alcohol Policy project. The experiment was implemented on Friday and Saturday evenings at bars and night clubs in two cities (94 in total). In the experiment, a male actor pretended to be clearly under the influence of alcohol and tried to buy a pint at the bar. The aim was to find out whether the bar staff followed the legislation prohibiting the sale of alcohol to customers who were clearly under the influence of alcohol. Thirty per cent of the staff refused to sell. Breaches were most common at downtown night clubs and big suburban nightspots. The probability of a member of the bar staff selling to a person under the influence of alcohol was increased by the presence of doormen, a queue at the bar, the gender and age of the staff member (female and older staff members being more prone to refuse), a general intoxication among the restaurant customers, and the timing of the purchase experiment (refusals being more probable during the early evening). The experiment suggests that instead of judicial norms, many bar staff members follow informal social rules in their action: intoxication is an acceptable part of the party culture. The purchase experiment showed that this type of actor-assisted field study can produce systematic research results.
Gold n' Metal
Authors: Tutenges Sébastien
Published: December 2017

■ This article is an anthropological case study of a bacchanalian club called Gold n' Metal. The aim is to arrive at a set of analytical concepts that may be used to describe the state of intoxication as it is lived out among the members of Gold n' Metal and among Ringsted youth at large.

A leitmotif in the article is the phenomenological advice that it is things in themselves that will teach us what they are. The focus is therefore on the state of intoxication per se and not on the background or underlying causes of alcohol and drug use.

Degradation, ethics of the instant, mortification, reflexive immoralism, and communitas – these are the concepts that I propose may be used as analytical torches to illuminate some of the essential characteristics of the state of intoxication as it is lived out among the members of Gold n' Metal.

The members of Gold n' Metal as well as most other young people from Ringsted do not use intoxicants as a means of escape. The young use intoxicants in order to intensify their relationship with self and other, as a shortcut to acute and spectacular experiences, and as a way to investigate and experiment with reality. It is therefore advocated that we visualize intoxication primarily as a movement towards and not only as a movement away from.
Alcohol-related violence as an explanation for the difference between homicide rates in Finland and the other Nordic countries
Authors: Lehti Martti , Kivivuor Janne
Published: December 2017

■ Aims

The article examines the links between alcohol consumption, drinking habits and the high homicide rates in Finland today from the point of view of the structure of homicides and the social status of the people involved in them. The Finnish situation is compared with that in the other Nordic countries, especially in Sweden.

■ Methods

The links between alcohol and homicidal crime are examined from the point of view of three main factors: the relative and absolute numbers of intoxicated offenders and victims, and regular substance abusers among offenders, and the patterns of victim-offender relationships. By combining the information, a general picture is formed of the significance and absolute levels of alcohol-connected homicides and what kinds of population groups are responsible for these crimes in each of the Nordic countries.

■ Results

Although the Finnish annual homicide rate is triple that of other Nordic countries, the social background and structure of homicidal crime are very similar in Finland, Sweden and Norway. In all the three Nordic countries the crimes are committed mainly by alcoholic, unemployed men living on the fringe of society. It also seems that the difference in the crime level between Finland and its Scandinavian neighbours is mainly caused by the alcohol-related violence of this group; the volume of other types of homicide is more or less the same.

■ Conclusion

Alcohol may explain, at least to some extent, the higher Finnish homicide rates compared to other Nordic countries, however, the linkage between alcohol consumption and violent crime is in today's Finland very similar to that in Sweden and Norway. Consequently, it is unlikely that the differences in the homicide rates would be caused directly by the differences in the general drinking cultures. Instead of looking for general cultural behaviour models to explain the higher rate of homicide, one should ask why middle-aged alcoholics appear in larger numbers in Finland than in other Nordic countries, and why they behave more violently.
Who “needs” compulsory care?
Authors: Wallander Lisa , Blomqvist Jan
Published: December 2017

■ Background

Due to its wide scope and the way in which it is applied, the Swedish compulsory care legislation for problem substance users is rather unique, both from an international and a Nordic perspective. Accordingly, from the time of its introduction about twenty-five years ago, the current legislation has repeatedly been criticised on ethical and scientific grounds.

■ Methods

This study employs the factorial survey approach to disentangle predictors relating to assessments of eligibility for compulsory care among a sample of 205 social workers from 36 social services units. The data, which comprise social workers' ideal assessments of randomly constructed hypothetical clients, have been analysed using multilevel logistic regression.

■ Results

The results show that overall, the social workers' assessments of client eligibility for compulsory care correspond well with the legislation. However, the results also reveal that several factors not specified in the legislation have an effect on these assessments. These include elements from the popular discourse on drugs in Sweden, the social workers' ideological convictions and the organisational structure of, and experiences of handling compulsory care applications at, the respondents' workplaces.
Polarisering i Alkoholkonsumtionen Bland Isländska Unga, 1995–2003
Authors: Bjarnason Thoroddur
Published: December 2017

Aims

Alcohol use among Icelandic adolescents has declined substantially in the last decade. This paper evaluates the source of this decline by examining changes in the frequency and quantity of adolescent alcohol consumption in the period 1995–2003.

Data and Methods

The total population of 10th grade (15–16 year old) students in Iceland was surveyed in 1995, 1999 and 2003 as part of the European School Survey Project on Alcohol and Other Drugs (ESPAD).

Results

The total volume of alcohol consumed by 15–16-year-old students declined by 15% between 1995 and 2003. This decline can be traced to an increasing number of abstainers. Among adolescent alcohol consumers drinking was more frequent and the total volume of alcohol they consumed increased by 19% between 1995 and 2003.

Conclusion

Declining alcohol use among Icelandic adolescents is due to fewer alcohol consumers and cannot be traced to less consumption by active drinkers. Adolescents who consume alcohol regularly have increased their consumption in this period.
Psychosocial interventions in drug-free treatment for opiate misuse. Conclusions from RCTs
Authors: Hesse Morten , Fridell Mats
Published: December 2017

Background

Methadone and buprenorphine are well-documented treatment options for opiate dependence, and there is substantial evidence to support adjunct psychosocial support for methadone maintenance treatment. Although drug-free treatment is preferred by a large number of patients and has considerable political support, less is known about treatment to support and maintain complete abstinence from all opiates, both illicit and prescribed.

Method

We conducted a review of studies of psychosocial interventions to support complete abstinence from opiates, to identify what conclusions, if any, can be drawn based on the existing literature. In total, 12 studies were identified. The quality of many studies was excellent, but follow-up was generally short, with only half the studies reporting post-treatment follow-up, and no follow-up longer than 21 months.

Discussion

Given that drug free treatment aims at lasting abstinence from opiates, this is a serious shortcoming of the literature. Among the few studies with post-treatment follow-up, studies using individual behaviour therapy showed little advantage over the control group with no individual behaviour therapy, and one study using behavioural family therapy showed an advantage for the experimental intervention over the standard intervention.

Conclusion

The limited evidence that exists suggests that treatment involving the family is superior to individual treatment. more research is required in this important field.
Teenagers' reported use of fictitious drugs. A study of false positives
Authors: Pape Hilde , Storvoll Elisabet E.
Published: December 2017

Aims

We have analyzed teenagers' self-reported experiences with a fictitious drug, and explored whether observed characteristics of individuals who report use of real, illegal substances change when overreporters are excluded from the analyses.

Methods & Data

Data stemmed from a school-based, nationwide survey of 13–19 year olds in Norway (N = 11928, response rate: 92%).

Results

Two percent reported that they had been offered the non-existent drug “zetacyllin”, whereas 0.5% allegedly had used it. “Zetacyllin users” appeared to be heavy users of existing substances, and therefore rates of GHB-, heroin-, LSD- and cocaine use dropped markedly when they were excluded from the sample. Correlates of such real drug use also changed when analyses without “zetacyllin users” were performed: The statistical effect of gender (i.e. being male) vanished, whereas the impact of age increased. The pattern of correlates with respect to indicators of socio-economic background also changed, but in different directions.

Conclusions

False positives may seriously distort the validity of survey-data on rare phenomena such as hard drug use. Due to this kind of response error, rates of uncommon behaviors may be inflated and observed correlates may deviate from the true pattern of correlates.
Social representations of alcohol and illegal drugs in focus group interviews with 18-year-olds and parents of teenagers
Authors: Abrahamson Maria
Published: December 2017

Aims

To analyse two generations' associations to the words ‘alcohol’ and ‘illegal drugs’

Methods

Focus groups were conducted with seven groups of 18-year-olds and four groups of parents of teenagers. The groups of young people and the groups of parents were in several respects each other's opposites. The young people were selected for focus group interviews because they drink and like to party. The parents were selected because they represent parents who take an active interest and care in young people's alcohol and drug habits. The focus group sessions started with the participants writing down all their associations, first to ‘alcohol’ and then to ‘illegal drugs’, with two minutes for each topic. The processing was done by classifying all words under separate headings depending on the theme of the associations.

Results

The most striking similarities between the young people of the study and the parents are that the two generations have similar notions of the benefits of alcohol. These regard having fun together with other people, creating a party atmosphere and feelings of togetherness, and also that alcohol offers relaxation. Notions about the short-term negative effects of alcohol are also similar. The most obvious difference between the generations is that young people lack any words connoting the long-term negative consequences from alcohol use. When it comes to illegal drugs, disassociation from illegal drugs is the foremost similarity between the young people and the parents. The differences in the main are that the young people have more concrete associations as well as value-free descriptions of the effects of using drugs and the times for using drugs. The parents describe the phenomenon more from a distance. Their associative paths extend to things that probably do not exist within their own sphere of reference. Another difference is that the young people sometimes have positive associations to drugs, which are missing among the parents.

Conclusions

In several ways young people and parents share the same ideas about alcohol and illegal drugs. In regard to alcohol they share the idea of the immediate beneficial properties of alcohol as well as its immediate negative consequences, ideas that seem culturally deep-rooted. In regard to drugs the associative picture given by young people and parents to a large extent also seems mutual, with respect to the predominantly negative picture. To a certain extent, however, the young people show in their associations that illegal drugs are a normal phenomena, while simultaneously showing that drugs are abnormal, and that most disassociate from them. Even in young people with positive connotations to drugs there are expressions of cautiousness and risk consciousness.
Alcohol Poisonings in Sweden 1987–2004: Trends and temporal patterns in times of a rapidly rising population drinking
Authors: Ramstedt Mats
Published: December 2017

Background

Hospitalisations with explicit mention of alcohol poisoning are common in Sweden with around 13 000 recorded cases for 2004. Despite the extent and seriousness of this alcohol-related consequence surprisingly few studies have used hospitalisation data in analysing alcohol poisonings. This paper examines trends in alcohol poisonings in Sweden during the period 1987–2004 a period characterised by one of the fastest increases in alcohol consumption in modern times.

Aims

Two main questions are addressed: 1. To what extent have trends in alcohol poisonings changed and do they differ between men and women in different age groups? 2. To what extent do alcohol poisonings display a temporal pattern?

Data

The data consists of all hospitalisations with alcohol poisoning as the main or contributory diagnosis during 1987–2004. which meant a total of 205 483 hospitalisations involving 145 020 individuals.

Results

Hospitalisations with an alcohol poisoning diagnosis have increased since the late 1990s for both men and women and include all age groups except for those aged 30–49 (men and women) and 20–29 (men). The temporal variation was most pronounced among younger age groups, peaking on weekends and during special festivities whereas, among older age groups, alcohol poisonings are just as likely to happen during ordinary weekdays.

Conclusion

Alcohol poisonings constitute a major problem in Sweden and have increased during recent years, though the increase does not cover all age groups. The temporal pattern of alcohol poisonings suggests that binge drinking on weekends and during festivities is an important factor behind alcohol poisonings in younger age groups (<30) whereas among older people it is more likely related to a longer period of heavy drinking among marginalised heavy drinkers.
Ethical Control of Social Research
Authors: Mäkelä Klaus
Published: December 2017

The rights of research subjects must not be violated, but the protection of research subjects should not distort research results or lead to breaches of scientific openness.

At least four reasons can be offered for being cautious in applying medical guidelines as such within other disciplines: 1. Interventions studied in typical medical research are much more invasive than typical social research. 2. The impact of medical and social research on research subjects involves quite different causal chains. 3. The relationship between research subjects and a sociologist carrying out a study of social power resembles the relationship between a journalist and a minister more closely than that of a doctor and a patient. 4. There are important differences between research processes in medicine and social sciences, particularly in qualitative studies. In social research, research designs are more open-ended.

Detailed information does not always improve the position of research participants. In social research, a few sentences often suffice to describe what the research is about.

Researchers must not harm their research subjects, but they need not benefit them.

No such promises should be made to research subjects that narrow the scope of scientific openness.

The interpretation of informed consent should not impede the use of the data in further research.

Research benefits and data-protection risks need to be weighed against each other. The researcher should have a right to gather data with an accuracy that is too high to allow the data to be published.

Among group level consequences of social research, attention should only be paid to unfair consequences.

The legal protection of the confidentiality of datasets in behavioural sciences needs to be improved.

Qualitative research plans should specify how the data will be preserved, anonymised and archived.
Polarization in Alcohol Consumption among Icelandic Adolescents, 1995–2003
Authors: Bjarnason Thoroddur
Published: December 2017

Aims

Alcohol use among Icelandic adolescents has declined substantially in the last decade. This paper evaluates the source of this decline by examining changes in the frequency and quantity of adolescent alcohol consumption in the period 1995–2003.

Data and Methods

The total population of 10th grade (15–16-year-olds) students in Iceland was surveyed in 1995, 1999 and 2003 as part of the European School Survey Project on Alcohol and Other Drugs (ESPAD).

Results

The total volume of alcohol consumed by 15–16-year-old students declined by 15% between 1995 and 2003. This decline can be traced to an increasing number of abstainers. Among adolescent alcohol consumers drinking was more frequent and the total volume of alcohol they consumed increased by 19% between 1995 and 2003.

Conclusion

Declining alcohol use among Icelandic adolescents is due to fewer alcohol consumers and cannot be traced to less consumption by active drinkers. Adolescents who consume alcohol regularly have increased their consumption in this period.
Price Elasticities of Alcoholic Beverages in Finland in 1995–2004
Authors: Vihmo Jouni
Published: December 2017

Aims

The purpose of this article is (i) to report on the long-term average price and expenditure elasticities of retail and licensed alcohol sales by type of beverage and distribution channel in Finland in 1995–2004 (ii) to assess the impacts of the major alcohol policy changes that were made in Finland in 2004 on consumer behaviour; and (iii) to discuss the impacts of the recent set of legislative reforms introduced by the Finnish government on alcohol consumption.

Methods & Data

The demand model applied that is based on a time series analysis is in keeping with Deaton's and Muellbauer's (1980) AIDS model. The dependent variables are the consumption of alcoholic beverages as a proportion of total private consumption. The models are estimated using Zellner's (1962) SURE estimation. The annual data cover retail alcohol sales and sales of alcoholic beverages on licensed premises in Finland in 1964–2004.

Results

Retail consumption has a price elasticity of 0.70, for consumption on licensed premises the figure is 0.58. The expenditure elasticity of retail consumption is 1.59 and that of licensed consumption 1.97. By type of beverage, wine has the highest price elasticity at 1.-41, while the figure for liquor is 0.83 and for beer 0.40. The expenditure elasticity for liquor is the highest at 1.57. As for consumption on licensed premises, liquor showed by far the highest elasticity at 2.34. The corresponding figures for wine and beer were 1.02 and 0.24, respectively. In licensed consumption, too, liquor showed by far the highest expenditure elasticity at 2.67.

Conclusions

The results of this study lend support to the view that changes in price elasticities happen very slowly. In spite of the momentous changes to Finnish alcohol control policy in 2004, the results reported are very similar to the elasticities in earlier studies. There have been no radical changes in the associations described by demand functions between alcohol prices and consumption levels. In the light of the time series available, the changes of 2004 have not perhaps been quite as significant as some commentators have suggested. The biggest changes have happened in consumption on licensed premises.
Taking Control by Loosing Control?: Patterns of heroin addiction in Estonia
Authors: Allaste Airi-Alina , Lagerspetz Mikko
Published: December 2017

Similarly to other countries in Eastern and Central Europe, Estonia has a relatively short experience of problems related to the use of illicit substances. In the previously “Real Socialist” countries in general, the increase in drug use among youth did not take place until the 1990s. This paper focuses on opiate users in Estonia. Unlike some other drugs, heroin does not have a trendy status, but is strongly rejected by the recreational drug users of the party scene. On the contrary, opiate users tend to be heavily marginalized. Relying on open-ended interviews with opiate users, this paper focuses on relationships between addiction and the cultural context of drug use. The majority of opiate users belong to the Russian-speaking minority, whose relative social status has considerably weakened after the restoration of Estonia's independence in 1991, and who have limited opportunities in the educational and labour markets. Young people started to use drugs from a desire to experience action, but the absence of other meaningful roles besides that of a drug user quickly led them towards addiction. However, the addicts were able to develop and maintain new competencies for living with heroin. It can be argued that addiction does not lead to a complete loss of control over their lives, but is rather an escape route from mainstream society. Heroin users do not become addicted to the drug alone but to the whole way of life centred on it.
Teenagers' “use” of Non-Existent Drugs: A study of false positives
Authors: Pape Hilde , Storvoll Elisabet E.
Published: December 2017

Aims

We have analyzed teenagers' self-reported experiences with a fictitious drug, and explored whether observed characteristics of individuals who report use of real illegal substances change when overreporters are excluded from the analyses.

Methods & Data

Data stemmed from a school-based, nationwide survey of 13–19-year-olds in Norway (N = 11928, response rate: 92%).

Results

Two percent reported that they had been offered the non-existent drug “zetacyllin”, whereas 0,5% allegedly had used it. “Zetacyllin users” appeared to be heavy users of existing substances, and therefore rates of GHB-, heroin-, LSD- and cocaine use dropped markedly when they were excluded from the sample. Correlates of such real drug use also changed when analyses without “zetacyllin users” were performed: The statistical effect of gender (i.e. being male) vanished, whereas the impact of age increased. The pattern of correlates with respect to indicators of socioeconomic background also changed, but in different directions.

Conclusions

False positives may seriously distort the validity of survey-data on rare phenomena such as hard drug use. Due to this kind of response error rates of uncommon behaviors may be inflated and observed correlates may deviate from the true pattern of correlates.
Interbedömarreliabilitet – Ett Tillförlitligt Mått På Standardiserade Intervjuer?
Authors: Anderberg Mats , Dahlberg Mikael
Published: December 2017

Aims

Inter-rater reliability studies are unusual as regards the standardised interview instruments used in the Swedish treatment care system for substance abusers. This article presents the results of a study intended to establish the inter-rater reliability of DOK interviews, through identification of question areas and items with high or low correspondence, and through analysis of how ratings differ between different interviewers.

Methods & Data

In total 41 practitioners participated in this study, with various experiences and from six different treatment units of the Swedish treatment care system for substance abusers. Participants gave their ratings and completed the DOK questionnaire based on a video-taped interview. Calculation and analysis of the correspondences were carried out for each individual question area and also each individual item by using appropriate statistical methods. Differences between the various assessors are presented.

Results

The results of the study show that the percentage agreement for the question areas and the items is generally high, with the exception of a few isolated questions.

Conclusions

Among the many possible different explanations for a lack of correspondence is that the questions could be ambiguously constructed and defined or the interview guidelines do not offer satisfactory guidance, or some questions could be too detailed. In addition, a few of the raters may lack sufficient training or experience when it comes to conducting interviews based on DOK. The combined results of the study show that there is a high level of inter-rater reliability, which indicates that in practice it is possible to utilise structured interviews such as DOK.
Explanations and Implications of Concurrent and Diverging Trends
Authors: Rossow Ingeborg , Mäkelä Pia , Österberg Esa
Published: December 2017

Aims

This paper summarizes and discusses the trends in alcohol consumption and various types of alcohol related-harm in the five Nordic countries—Denmark. Finland, Iceland, Norway and Sweden.

Results and Conclusions

The development in alcohol consumption versus alcohol-related harm is mixed. In some cases the trends are fairly parallel whereas in other cases they are diverging. This article lays out the different potential methodological and substantive explanations for the diverging trends. as well as discussing their likely explanatory value. Although we have observed that trends in alcohol consumption are not necessarily followed by similar trends in all indicators of alcohol-related harm, we conclude that there is still in general reason to assume that a significant change in total alcohol consumption in a Nordic country is—all other things being equal—likely to be followed by a change in the same direction in various alcohol-related harms in that population.
Trends in Alcohol Consumption and Alcohol-Related Harms in Norway around the Turn of the Millennium
Authors: Rossow Ingeborg
Published: December 2017

Aims

This study aims to examine whether the significant increase in alcohol consumption in Norway since 1993 is reflected in various alcohol-related harms over the same period.

Data

The study draws on various register statistics and population sample surveys that provide mostly annual time series data on alcohol-related mortality morbidity crimes and other social harms.

Results and Discussion

When examining a wide range of alcohol-related harms some—but not all—harm trends were found to follow the same increasing trend as alcohol consumption. The results are discussed with respect to data accuracy as well as more substantive possible explanations for a mismatch in trends in consumption and harms.
Youthful Drinking with a Purpose
Authors: Demant Jakob
Published: December 2017

Drawing on a study consisting of 28 focus groups, this paper will discuss how drinking practices and partying is drawn into negotiations of gender and age identity. The article focuses on how boys and girls, aged 14–16, construct identities based on the discourses on alcohol and partying that can be identifed in the focus group data material. The focus group material forms a unique insight into how alcohol and partying are used in these negotiations. Together with Judith Butler's concepts of performance and citation, the concept of intersectionality will form a theoretical background for the discussion of how alcohol is used to perform age and sex in a culturally intelligible way. The girls position themselves as feminine and mature through their drinking and through sexualizing older boys. The “heterosexualizing” of the party-space creates a paradoxical position for the boys of the same age as the girls. They have limited possibility of making impressions on girls their own age, and they cannot turn towards younger girls because that will position them as immature. The intersection of age and sex creates a separation within the party scene, where girls and boys of the same age often attend different parties. The boys end up in same-sex parties where they construct masculinity by way of binge drinking more than in their gender play with the girls.
Mind the Gender Gap!
Authors: Østergaard Jeanette
Published: December 2017

This article investigates the gender gap in alcohol use and partying among Danish adolescents by means of a survey of 15–16-year-olds. The aim is, first, to reveal the present gender differences in alcohol use when using measurements such as ‘age of onset of drinking’, ‘frequency of intoxication’, ‘binge drinking’ etc. Second, by drawing on other types of questions, the issue of the gender gap is readdressed from a perspective which contextualises adolescents' use of alcohol. The context is the last party the adolescent went to, and the questions centre on whether boys and girls party differently and how alcohol might effect how they party. By using graphical models for high-dimensional contingencies developed by Kreiner (1987; 1996; 2003), it is first analysed if consumption of alcohol makes boys rate the party more successful than girls. Second, by mapping out what boys and girls do when they party it is analysed whether alcohol consumption results in boys and girls doing the same or different activities at the party. Finally, it is analysed what activities are associated with rating the party as successful. At the very end it is then discussed how a gender gap in alcohol consumption could also be explained by how alcohol is embedded in a social setting, where the adolescents perform traditional gender roles.
Prevention of Alcohol- and Tobacco-Related Harms
Authors: Craplet Michel
Published: December 2017

Based on a definition of comprehensive prevention, the author submits prevention actions in alcohol and tobacco related problems to the question: “Education or control, must we choose?” After reviewing the history, the author describes the current panorama of health education actions and control before discussing some methodological and ethical questions concerning the methods and the actors of prevention. He tries to define “prevention ideal” – which must be distinguished from “ideal prevention” and its totalitarian abuse – to introduce the second part of his text which deals with the question of evaluation of the effectiveness of alcohol- and tobacco-related problems prevention.

The author confirms the efficacy of control measures, but also shows that education has a certain degree of efficacy, despite the dominant trends in Anglo-Saxons countries. He also shows that education is necessary in the context of many European countries. After discussing the issue of cost-effectiveness ratio, the author emphasise the need for global prevention taking into account cultural and political elements to ensure efficient as well as effective prevention and social acceptance of this prevention.
Drug-Related Harm According to Opiate Users on Buprenorphine Treatment
Authors: Weckroth Antti
Published: December 2017

Aims

The purpose of this article is to analyse the meanings given to substances as intoxicants, medicine and treatment from the client perspective in buprenorphine treatment. How do the clients construct drug-related harms and how do they act to reduce the harms?

Methods

The material is ethnographic and consists of participant observation and client interviews. The data is gathered from an institutional treatment facility offering buprenorphine treatment. Clients stressed the excitement of heroin use as opposed to the safety of buprenorphoine. The negative aspects of amphetamins are strongly emphasised. They did not justify the need for substitution therapy. The negative effects of heroin had a dual meaning in that they also assigned a positive user identity and justified the need for medication. The safety aspect of burprenorphine was linked to nonexistent overdose risk and to difficulty in tracing the substance in urine tests. The function of burprenorphine as an intoxicant was to restrict the harm resulting from the use of other intoxicants. The clients in substitution treatment emphasised the positive effect of buprenorfine as a medicine while those in detox emphasised the negative effects. Treatment itself receives positive meaning when it offers belief in achieving the personal treatment goal and negative meaning if it fails to do so.

Conclusion

The dual political role of bruprenorphine as a life saving medication and an evil drug complicates the status and role of clients in buprenorphine treatment.
Artikel
Authors: Perälä Riikka
Published: December 2017

This article looks at how intravenous drug users in Finland perceive their problems and the social and health care interventions designed to address those problems.

Aim

The aim is to open up new perspectives on the current debate around the services and treatments available to drug users. The study is based on an ethnographic observation and interview material collected at health counselling centres for intravenous drug users, including users' talk about the service system and their service needs as well as my own observations of how drug users cope within the service system.

Methods

The discourse analysis is grounded in the concept and idea of talking back, which I use to challenge current constructions (often by experts and the authorities) of the drug abuse problem. I juxtapose these constructions with drug users' interpretations, which I address by the concept of interpretative framework.

Results

Drug users themselves also describe their lives largely via their problems, but their explanations of these problems are rather different from those offered by experts and the authorities. The first key characteristic is the tension that is constructed between drug users who look upon themselves as abnormal and the so-called normal population. A second distinctive feature in drug users' everyday life is its multiple, simultaneous problems and it's oppressive, unbearably forced rhythm.

Conclusion

Existing social and health care interventions do not provide adequate support to drug users, but on the contrary may even complicate their lives.
Evidence-Based Practice in “the Real World”
Authors: Pedersen Mads Uffe
Published: December 2017

The term evidence-based practice (EBP) has developed into a mantra not just within the medical area of treatment, but within the psychosocial realm of treatment as well. Today, decision-makers and funding authorities are increasingly demanding that psychosocial treatment should be evidence-based and that the different types of treatment facilities should attempt to adapt to this, inter alia by providing offers that are reputed to be evidence-based. In this article, EBP is viewed under a slightly different perspective than the one usually used when discussing it. It is claimed that evidence-based counselling and therapeutic methods only account for a small part of the strategies that are relevant for treating clients with substance and/or alcohol misuse. In the first part of the article, EBP is defined and placed in relation to evidence-based counselling/therapy (EBC/T). In the article's second part, the relevance of – not least – EBC/T in the “real world” is discussed. The real world is defined as, among other things, “what clients receive, not what they are offered” and “what clients need, not what the system needs”. This is illustrated by discussing two Danish research projects that demonstrate, inter alia, that what is received does not have much in common with what is offered.
Arbetsmarknadsstatus, krav och stöd: Ensamstående bidragsmottagare med problematisk alkoholkonsumtion
Authors: Lisa. Skogens,
Published: December 2017

Aims

In the study social assistance case files of single male clients with problematic alcohol consumption were studied. The aim was to see whether actions by the social worker also did focus on treating the client's drinking problem and if so, if the client's labour-market status influenced the decision made by the social worker.

Methods & Data

The study investigated all case files from nine municipalities during 1999 that involved social assistance to single men over an extended period (six months or more) or contacts over several intervals (three contacts or more). Alcohol-related notes were present in 297 case files and in these files, data were collected on the client's age, first contact with the social service system, ability to support oneself financially through work, type of alcohol-related notes and notes on type of actions and decisions by the social worker. Within the 297 case files, four groups of clients emerged. Two of them were chosen: those judged as fully capable of working (C group = 122 clients) and those not able to work at all (N group = 48 clients): These were then compared mainly in relation to the notes of actions/decisions by their social worker. Data were not randomly sampled and the results can thus not be interpreted as representative for a larger population. However, there is no obvious reason to believe that the social work done in the study municipalities differs from the work done in other similar municipalities.

Results

The main result shows that demands for participation in some kind of treatment and/or providing “proof” of soberness in order to receive a higher extent of social assistance were found more in the C group than in the N group

Conclusions

The fewer demands for treatment/soberness in the N group might be interpreted as reflecting a greater extent of social care for this group, in terms of social assistance, but a lesser extent of social care in terms of concerns of their possible problematic drinking.
“Hellre till kompisar än till närstående”: Solidaritetens betydelse då unga vuxna langar alkohol till minderåriga
Authors: Simonen Jenni. , Tigerstedt Cristoffer.
Published: December 2017

Aim

In Finland it is illegal to furnish alcohol to minors. Both adults and young people break this rule quite regularly. In this article we discuss the views and experiences of young people who are of legal drinking age about furnishing alcohol to minors: to whom do they furnish alcohol and to whom do they not, on what conditions do they do that and how do they justify their actions. The focus of analysis is on the social dynamics of furnishing alcohol, i.e. the rules that govern this activity among young people of legal age.

Data

The material for the study consists of seven group interviews with young people aged 17–23. A total of 57 upper secondary school, vocational school and college students took part, 25 women and 32 men. We collected the data in the Hämeenlinna region in autumn 2005 as part of the Local Alcohol Policy project.

Analyses

The analysis applies the concept of solidarity, which is divided into two constituent parts: solidarity towards one's friends and solidarity towards one's family. The rules of furnishing alcohol to a minor depend on how the furnishing is framed, i.e. from the vantage-point of friends or family community. Solidarity with friends rests primarily on a sense of equality and togetherness with peers, whereas the main emphasis in solidarity with the family is on education and the sense of caring by the family. On the basis of the different logics of solidarity an inner circle and an outer circle are created: alcohol will usually be furnished to members of the inner circle (peer group, siblings, close relatives), but not to members of the outer circle (half-acquaintances, strangers, kids who are “too” young). However, it is noteworthy that furnishing alcohol to under-age siblings did cause much moral discussion in the groups we interviewed. In other words, “for friends rather than for family”.

Conclusion

The furnishing of alcohol by young adults to minors is no random or arbitrary activity. It is based on a set of rules that follow the different logics of friends and family solidarity–rules that are not always clear to the young people who are purchasing and furnishing the alcohol, let alone to others. Public discussions on the furnishing of alcohol are not usually based on an understanding of these rules.
Framework for Infectious Disease Analysis: A comprehensive and integrative multi-modeling approach to disease prediction and management
Authors: Erraguntla Madhav , Zapletal Josef , Lawley Mark
Published: December 2017

The impact of infectious disease on human populations is a function of many factors including environmental conditions, vector dynamics, transmission mechanics, social and cultural behaviors, and public policy. A comprehensive framework for disease management must fully connect the complete disease lifecycle, including emergence from reservoir populations, zoonotic vector transmission, and impact on human societies. The Framework for Infectious Disease Analysis is a software environment and conceptual architecture for data integration, situational awareness, visualization, prediction, and intervention assessment. Framework for Infectious Disease Analysis automatically collects biosurveillance data using natural language processing, integrates structured and unstructured data from multiple sources, applies advanced machine learning, and uses multi-modeling for analyzing disease dynamics and testing interventions in complex, heterogeneous populations. In the illustrative case studies, natural language processing from social media, news feeds, and websites was used for information extraction, biosurveillance, and situation awareness. Classification machine learning algorithms (support vector machines, random forests, and boosting) were used for disease predictions.
Cell-Free DNA Quantification and Methylation Status of DCC Gene as Predictive Diagnostic Biomarkers of Lung Cancer in Patients Reported at Gulab Devi Chest Hospital, Lahore
Authors: Aslam Muhammad Shahbaz , Shaeer Abeera , Abbas Zaigham , Ahmed Aftab , Gull Iram , Athar Muhammad Amin
Published: December 2017

The worldwide high mortality rate of lung cancer could be reduced significantly by its noninvasive early detection. The quantitative analysis of cell-free circulating DNA in plasma presents a potential noninvasive approach for liquid biopsy of tumor. In this study, real-time polymerase chain reaction–based approach was used to quantify free circulating DNA in plasma. The concentration of free circulating DNA was checked using human telomerase reverse transcriptase gene as marker, and amplification status of oncogene RAC-β serine/threonine protein kinase along with the DNA methylation status of tumor suppressor gene (deleted in colorectal cancer) was assessed. The concentration of free circulating DNA in patients with lung cancer (22.8 ng/mL) was found approximately 6 times above than the value detected in controls (2.8 ng/mL). Considerable variation in the AKT2 copy number was observed in patients with lung cancer and controls ( P < .000). Aberrant methylation of the deleted in colorectal cancer promoter was found to be highly specific (100%), as none of the control plasma samples showed aberrant methylation. The quantification of free circulating DNA along with determination of AKT2 amplification and deleted in colorectal cancer promoter methylation status appeared promising to differentiate patients with lung cancer from healthy individuals.