ABSTRACT

The study aim at analyzing titled “INVESTIGATING THE EFFECTS OF DRUGS ON STUDENTS SOCIAL INTERACTION IN THE UNIVERSITY OF BAMENDA” in Bamenda 1 Sub Division: implications for mental health. The main objectives of this study were to examine the effects on drugs on students’ social interaction in the university of Bamenda Cameroon.  Descriptive research designed was used in conducting this study with a sample size of 50 students. And the instrument of data collection being the questionnaires.

The data collected was then analyzed using SPSS.The findings of the study revealed that drug abuse has an effect on students mental health. The researcher further recommended that students should stop abusing drugs in schools and in the community at large and parents should also advice their children about the effects of these drugs if taken wrongly. The researcher ended by suggesting that further research should be conducted in other universities in Cameroon to see the correlation between the results obtained.     

CHAPTER ONE

GENERAL INTRODUCTION

The history of the human race has been the history of drug abuse (Maithya, 2009). In itself, the use of drugs does not constitute an evil. Drugs, properly administered, have been a medical blessing. For example, herbs, roots, bark leaves and plants have been used to relieve pain and help control diseases. However, over the past few decades, the use of illegal drugs has spread at an unprecedented rate and has reached at every part of the world (United Nations, 2002). This consumption has led to a change in the social interaction amongst students.

Social interaction is a mutually regulated process in which infants, children, and adults on a second-by-second basis communicate and respond to relational intentions, needs, and meanings of the other. The mutual regulatory process is not smooth but is characterized by a matching and mismatching of intentions and meanings. The messiness of mutual regulation is resolved by a reparatory process in which mismatches are transformed into matches. Experimental evidence from the still-face paradigm demonstrates infants’ ability to regulate their own and their partner’s behavior and the interaction and evidence from maternal depression demonstrates how a failure of reparation compromises development. E. Tronick, in Encyclopedia of Infant and Early Childhood Development, (2008).

Whilst we know that substance use directly impacts the mind and the body, it’s important to remember that the use of substances not only affects the individual using the substance, it can also have a significantly wider impact that produces negative social consequences. Consequences like destructive behavior, high-risk sexual behavior, reckless behavior to name a few.

Background of the study

Attempts to understand the nature of illicit drug abuse and addiction can be traced back for centuries, however, the search has always been limited by the scientific theories and social attitudes available or dominant at any one time. Dr. Benjamin Rush, a founder of the first medical school in the United States and a signer of the Declaration of Independence, was one of the pioneers of U.S. drug abuse research. However, he had few scientific resources available to attack the problem. The intricacies of cellular response to a drug could not be understood until tools were developed to measure the response and to integrate this knowledge with complex cellular biochemistry—a technology that has been developed only in the past decade. One can compare this situation with that of pneumonia. A myriad of treatments and partially effective remedies were used until the discovery of penicillin, when the old treatments became a part of medical history. It is now possible, however, to be optimistic that the tools needed to resolve the addiction problem are at hand. (David F. Musto, M.D (1996))

Today, more than 10% of the adult U.S and World population is addicted to drugs. Alcohol is responsible for more than 29% of all fatal traffic accidents. Drugs and alcohol cost the U.S and the World . more than 600 billion dollars a year and they destroy lives. Studies show that excessive alcohol consumption is responsible for 2.5 million years of potential life lost annually. Addiction also puts a strain on healthcare facilities. Almost half of all U.S. hospital beds are used to treat health conditions directly related to alcohol consumption. Unfortunately, most people who become addicted to either drugs or alcohol first use the substance as teenagers. Excessive alcohol consumption is the leading cause of death of American teenagers.

Almost anyone can become addicted. A combination of genetic and environmental factors can trigger the disease in at-risk individuals. With the rise in population, drug addiction and abuse have also risen along with it. While the early part of the nation’s history saw people addicted to mostly plant and alcohol-based substances, the nature of addiction is the same in the 21st century. But the types of substances people are most addicted to are different. Below, we’ll cover the history of drug abuse in the U.S., what causes addiction, and who is statistically most likely to be affected by the disease. We’ll also cover the most commonly abused substances in the U.S. today. (Mission Harbor Behavioral Health, 23)

Drug abuse is defined as the use of a substance for a purpose not consistent with legal or medical guidelines (WHO, 2006). It has a negative impact on health or functioning and may take the form of drug dependence, or be part of a wider spectrum of problematic or harmful behaviour (DH, 2006b). In the UK, the Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs (ACMD) characterises problem drug use as a condition that may cause an individual to experience social, psychological, physical or legal problems related to intoxication and/or regular excessive consumption, and/or dependence (ACMD, 1998).

In this guideline, dependence is defined as a strong desire or sense of compulsion to take a substance, a difficulty in controlling its use, the presence of a physiological withdrawal state, tolerance of the use of the drug, neglect of alternative pleasures and interests and persistent use of the drug, despite harm to oneself and others (WHO, 2006). Dependence is diagnosed according to the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-IV) when three or more of the following criteria are present in a 12-month period: tolerance; withdrawal; increasing use over time; persistent or unsuccessful attempts to reduce use; preoccupation or excessive time spent on use or recovery from use; negative impact on social, occupational or recreational activity; and continued use despite evidence of its causing psychological or physical problems (American Psychiatric Association [APA], 1994).

The diagnosis of dependence is clearest with opioids. The WHO states that opioid dependence develops after a period of regular use of opioids, with the time required varying according to the quantity, frequency and route of administration, as well as factors of individual vulnerability and the context in which drug use occurs. Opioid dependence is not just a heavy use of the drug but a complex health connotation that has social, psychological and biological determinants and consequences, including changes in the brain. It is not a weakness of character or will.’ (WHO, 2006)

However, dependence, as characterised by the above definition, can also occur with stimulants and cannabis. Repeated use of a drug can lead to the development of tolerance in which increased doses of the drug are required to produce the same effect. Tolerance develops to opioids, stimulants and cannabis. Cessation of use leads to reduced tolerance and this may present significant risks for individuals who return to drug doses at a level to which they had previously developed tolerance. This can result in accidental overdoses and, in the case of opioid misuse, could lead to respiratory depression and death.

Withdrawal syndromes have clearly been identified after cessation or reduction of opioid and stimulant use. DSM-IV criteria for a withdrawal disorder include the development of a substance-specific syndrome due to cessation or reduction in use; the syndrome causing clinically significant distress; and symptoms not due to a general medical condition or better explained by another mental disorder (APA, 1994). While withdrawal effects have been associated with cessation of heavy cannabis use, their clinical significance is uncertain at present (Budney et al., 2004).

Pujal Mondal,(2012), The concept of interaction has become one of the fundamental and most nearly universal ideas almost in each of the fields of knowledge physical, biological and social. But it should not be inferred that interaction as it takes place in the inorganic or organic order is the same in all respects as is inter­action in the super-organic (human-social) realm. It is also the core datum of sociology. Social contact is the first place of interaction. It rather initiates interaction. Social contact refers to the connection between persons and groups. For social contact, social proximity (mental contact) and not the physical proximity (bodily contact) is essential. Social contact differs from physical or bodily contact. Mere physical contact (proximity) of individuals does not constitute a group. This is why, it is said, ‘where there is contact of human minds, there association exists; where there is no contact, there is a state of isolation.

Komi T. German and Megan L. Robbins, (2020) Personality is often expressed and developed through social interactions; thus, exchanges between individuals are in many ways what personality psychologists seek to understand (Mehl et al. 2006; Pianesi et al. 2008). A core concern among personality psychologists is to identify observable, behavioral manifestations of personality, making social interactions one ideal context in which to study it.

Social interactions are situations involving two or more people, wherein the behavior of each person occurs in response to the behavior of the other (Reis and Wheeler 1991). People use others’ behavior to make inferences about their personality, to anticipate their actions, and to regulate behavior accordingly (Pianesi et al. 2008). In doing so, perceptions of oneself and others are often anchored in.  

This research is based on Lary Cyril Jensen’s Social learning theory, (2020), one of the interesting explanations for adolescence drug use offered by this theory has to do with example that is set for adolescence by other.The two central notions of this view are that drug use is learned and Its functional. This model focuses on the interaction between the environment, the individual and the drug as a way to understand the complexity of the drug experience.  No single factor is viewed sufficient for understanding drug use or the problems encountered by an individual or within a society.

In the 1960s proponents of ‘social learning’ rejected the notion that people with drug problems are ‘bad’, ‘mad’, ‘sick’ or susceptible to the power of the substance.  This model holds that drug using behaviour is able be learned and reinforced by peers, parents, partners and/or the media. Drug use is seen as neither good nor bad. The choice to use drugs is understood as a balance of the costs and benefits that must be considered in terms of the drug, the individual and the environment.

Social learning interventions focus on altering the client’s relationship with their environment. A key concept is self-efficacy, which refers to a person’s beliefs about their ability to perform tasks and achieve goals. A person’s beliefs about their ability to stop problem drug use can influence the outcome of the attempt to cease. Coping skills and cognitive restructuring methods are used to assist people to change and control their drug use. Prevention strategies address individual environmental conditions that foster problematic behaviour. ( YouthAOD Toolbox). The idea is that adolescence pick up the behaviors after that of parents, peers and others in the community. Parents who use alcohol or drugs as means of coping with life problem set an example for the adolescence. If both parents use psychoactive drugs the adolescence children are likely to follow.

In Cameroon, the national anti-drugs committee reports that 21% of the population had used substances, 60% of whom are youths aged 20-25 years (some of whom are students in tertiary schools). Moreover, more than, 12000 young people less than 15 years of age use narcotic drugs and other psychotropic substances.

Life in tertiary education is a period when students transition to independence and freedom from direct supervision of their families, self-decision-making, and intense academic pressure. They share living areas with strangers, form new social groups and friends, balance social engagements with academic and other life responsibilities. These expose them to certain social norms which youths uphold, which are divergent from the values they originally adopted from their parents. These perceived norms motivate the youth to indulge in unhealthy behaviors such as smoking and alcohol and drug use. Some common substances used by students in tertiary institutions are: tobacco, alcohol and opioid. Alcohol and tobacco are seen as ”gateway” substances´ as per the gateway drug theory; which suggests that using soft substances like cannabis, alcohol and tobacco is a behavioral doorway that leads to consumption of the so-called hard drugs like heroin, cocaine, crystal methamphetamine and ecstasy. In Cameroon, alcohol aside, the most common substance in demand is cannabis (58.54%) usually associated with tobacco. Other consumed substances in Cameroon include: tramadol (44.62%), cocaine (12.10%), traditional makeshift preparations (7.59%), solvents (7.36%) and heroin (5.7%). Mbanga et al. reported tramadol and cannabis as the most consumed recreational substances among medical and nursing students in Cameroon. Several studies have shown that these substances have severe negative effects such as poor grades at school, violent acts (arguments, fights), poor sleep quality, robbery, accidental injuries, engagement in unprotected sex, dependence/addiction and problems with their teachers, friends and parents as well as fuelling insurgency and terrorism. There is a deficit of data on substance use in Cameroon and more specifically among university students. This has a serious effect on any attempt through interventions to solve this ever-growing problem. Therefore, the thrust of this study is to assess the magnitude, pattern and factors associated with substance use among students in the University of Bamenda, Cameroon.

Statement of the Problem

Drugs, which are compounds or chemicals, are meant to cure illnesses, provide relief, or helping in diagnosis of diseases. But nowadays it is being abused. Due to drug abuse in the university milieu, the attitudes of students have changed, students academic performance, students behaviour have also changed, to the extent that students social interaction have also changed. Which is a call for concern in the university milieu. The researcher realizes that the larger society has been handicapped about the rising incidence of drug abuse with its influence on social interaction. This study will identify those drugs that are commonly abused and how it has contributed to the falling standard in education, besides the rising cases of youth indiscipline in the larger society. It will highlight how counseling can help reduce this problem to its barest minimum. Thus the researcher deems it necessary to carry out this research work which will be beneficial to many audiences. Some of the benefits which are; This research is to help them adopt a more strategic way or method in discouraging students in the university of Bamenda Cameroon from indiscriminate taking of drugs, also aiding in understanding to a large extent how drug abuse has contributed to recent indiscipline and decline in student performance and perhaps adapt a better method to check this ugly trend.