Substance use & misuse
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Substance use & misuse · Aug 2003
ReviewHow can sociological theory help our understanding of addictions?
Those who work in the addiction field usually use the pharmacological or medical model, psychological theories of behavior, or operate within the confines of a criminal justice perspective. Contributions from the field of sociology are limited to use of the methods of sociological investigations, primarily population surveys, which, typically, are used to identify groups at-risk for specific types of drug use. ⋯ Experts in addiction have accused sociologists who study addiction of being "atheoretical." Paradoxically, in the sociology field, the most highly cited article is Merton's theory of addiction. This article will examine the contributions of sociological theory to our understanding of addiction, including social definitions of "the problem of addiction" and mechanisms to account for individual drug use within a social context that defines it as problematic.