Social Bonds in the Initiation of

Methamphetamine Use

Miriam Boeri¹, Paul Boshears², David Gibson¹,

and Liam Harbry³

¹Kennesaw State University

²The European Graduate School
³DeKalb County Drug Court
Based on our ethnographic study of 100 current and
former users of methamphetamine, we found that
participants in this study overwhelmingly, reference the
social pressures and environments that initiate, spur,
and inhibit their use or cessation of methamphetamine
and other drugs.
In privileging the social component of addiction, we
contribute to the developing literature on the social
conceptualization of addiction (May 2001, Gibson et al.
2004, Hughes 2007, Pilkington 2007, Graham et al.
2008).
Theoretical Background
Hughes (2007) proposes a “social conceptualization” of
addiction emphasizing substance abuse “as a set of
embodied social practices.”
“Addiction” is a discursive practice – a narrative that
people perform. In performing this discourse, which
has developed within a short but history, addicts affirm
and reinvigorate their identities as “addicts”.
The discourse surrounding addiction itself limits how we
can understand addiction as well as how we might
transform the phenomenon.
Let's reexamine our fundamental assumptions:
 Notions of Selfhood¹

A B

¹ Kasulis, Thomas P. 2002. Intimacy or Integrity: Philosophy and

Cultural Difference. Honolulu: University of Hawai`i Press.
 Notions of Selfhood

B
I C
H A D

G E
F This is the essential purpose of the
prison – to disallow relationships
(Kasulis 2002) between society and the prisoner
 Notions of Selfhood

A R B

Spouse, Parent, Spouse, Child,

Friend, etc. Friend, etc.

(Kasulis 2002)
 Notions of Selfhood

A B

(Kasulis 2002)
 Notions of Selfhood

E
B F
A
C G
D

(Kasulis 2002)
Supporting the Social
Conceptualization
• Initiation to methamphetamine, according to our
respondents, occurred in familiar social networks:
among family, friends, and co-workers.
• As the literature has indicated (Pilkington 2007),
security, trust and mutual accountability are central
factors in the decision making process of drug users.
• Without the proper social capital, access to
substances of abuse is greatly impacted (Sexton et
al 2005).
• In order for the two conditions to be met,
respondents had to perform their roles properly, in
performing these roles, they reinforced their
identities
Family
Between 2000 and 2005, 15,000 children were found in meth labs in the
U.S. (Zernike 2005)

“So all my dad’s friends were junkies. They were shooting Demerol, everything
you could shoot. ...[H]e was my...dad’s best friend. ...[F]rom the time I was
twelve I’d seen these dudes firing dope, shooting dope up until I was
eighteen years old…But one day I come in and I said let me try some of that.
I poured some in a spoon, shot some water in it, the dude was trying to tell
my dad, ‘you need to help him or let me help him or something’, before he
had it out I had it pulled up and fired it in my arm just like a champ. Just like I
was a professional at it” (34 year old white male respondent).

“It was with my step-grandmother…she handed me some in my hand and said,

‘eat it,’ and I did and it kept me up for a while” (22 year old white female)
Pilkington (2007), “young people’s narratives are infused more with
notions of security, trust and mutual accountability than they are with
‘risk’. In making drugs choices – regardless of whether the choice
itself is to use, experiment with, or abstain from drugs – it is the
friendship group [here we extend it to include the family] which is the
key reference point for young people and provides a safe and secure
context in which to make those choices” (386).

“I know that’s why I started. My brother – I didn’t think anything he did

was wrong, you know. He was perfect to me” (25 year old white
female).
This seems to support the call for an expanded sense of “risk” because
what is considered risky behavior is no longer the outcome of
consuming substances of abuse (i.e. having a hang over in the
morning, becoming habituated to tobacco, developing a
methamphetamine dependence), rather the risk is an ontological one
– namely losing membership in an identity-forming relationship, be it
as a member of a kinship system or peer group
Friends
For many, drug use provided the catalyst to new friends or social groups
they had not had before. Drug use, and addiction, often appeared to
be the test of compatibility between people and groups.

“I guess having it [attention] in the private school, you know, and I guess
being popular then and not being as popular in public school, that was
a reason to do things I did to get that attention as the crazy guy or the
class clown again. I guess doing drugs, it was new at the time, you
know. Hanging out with these people, these new people, I found
acceptance in them...” (30-year-old, white male).
These networks of friends that are consistently using drugs together
provide the culture and adopted norms that are conducive for
continued use. These social bonds provide the people and
connections to access methamphetamine (or other drugs), opening
gateways to various settings to conduct illicit drug use, and provide
social solidarity among the individuals involved.
Friends as Family

“I guess being in her house and staying with her, we were all like a
family and that’s just what we did and I liked it. I liked the way it
made me feel.”
What made her feel so good was not simply the effects of the
methamphetamine, but the familiarity itself, so it seems.
Whether respondents were using methamphetamine with their
actual family, or friends whom they consider family, as long as
these purpose-full drug-using relationships were maintained,
their drug use would continue.
This insight is crucial to understanding patterns of cessation and
relapse.
To cease to be an addict is to cease to be oneself, a symbolic (but
fundamentally real) suicide.
Reciprocal Relationships

“Yeah, my friends always got it. I never had to worry

about getting it” (26-year-old, white male).
Not having to worry about it is precisely the nature of
culture. Douglas (1992) culture is a “system of
persons holding one another mutually accountable.”
That is, reciprocity is central to understanding addiction.
• Evident in the “cooking” practices – you steal for me,
I “cook” for you
• It is the fundamental assumption in the 12-Step
process