A Cultural Psychology Approach to “Drug Abuse” Prevention

Abstract

Much research on the etiology of adolescent drug use has focused on posited risk and protective factors at the level of the individual or small group. However, those proximal influences exist within a cultural context that also influences drug use. To prevent drug use in the diverse population of the United States, research is needed on the influence of the cultural context on adolescent drug use, including the effects of immigrating from one cultural or sociodemographic context to another, as well as the effects of living within two different cultural systems simultaneously. Theoretical models and research methods from cultural psychology and cultural sociology are well-suited to examine the cultural context of drug use. We examine causal mechanisms by which acculturation might affect drug use by using two paradigms to conceptualize culture: a stress/coping paradigm and a cultural values paradigm. Implications of cultural risk and protective factors for transdisciplinary research on drug abuse prevention are also discussed.

• Acculturation
• Acculturative stress
• Culture
• Cultural competence
• Cultural context
• Cultural psychology
• Risk factors
• Protective factors
• Resilience
• Stressors

Notes

¹ “Hispanic” is the respondent's own identification with a Hispanic ethnic group, not a racial category.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Jennifer B. Unger

Jennifer B Unger, Ph.D. is Associate Professor of Preventive Medicine at the University of Southern California Keck School of Medicine. Her research interests include the psychosocial and sociocultural risk and protective factors for adolescent substance use and other health-related behaviors. She received her doctorate in Health Behavior Research from the University of Southern California in 1996.

Lourdes Baezconde-Garbanati

Lourdes Baezconde-Garbanati, Ph.D, M.P.H., is Assistant Professor in Preventive Medicine and Sociology at the University of Southern California (USC). Her areas of expertise are in cancer control and tobacco prevention with special emphasis on reaching priority populations, mainly of Hispanic/Latino origin. Important aspects of her work have focused on ensuring the translation of research in tobacco prevention to public health practice. She has participated as an author or coauthor in many scientific publications and received multiple awards and recognition for her work in conducting culturally competent community-based research and for including communities in participatory research. For example, in 1999 she received from the American Public Health Association, the Latino Caucus Most Distinguished Career Award and in 2000 the Culture, Community and Prevention Science Award from the Society for Prevention Research. Dr. Baezconde-Garbanati received her doctorate in Community Health Sciences in 1994 from the School of Public Health at the University of California Los Angeles (UCLA). Her main area of concentration was Social Epidemiology. In 1986 she received a Masters in Public Health at the same university. In 1981 she graduated with Great Distinction in Clinical Psychology from the Universite Catholique de Louvain.

Sohaila Shakib

Sohaila Shakib, Ph.D., is Research Associate at the Institute for Health Promotion and Disease Prevention Research at University of Southern California. Through a National Cancer Institute postdoctoral fellowship, she received training in transdisciplinary prevention research at the USC Institute for Health Promotion and Disease Prevention Research. She is a Senior Research Associate in the Department of Preventive Medicine at the USC Keck School of Medicine. She is a Project Leader on the Transdisciplinary Tobacco Use Research Center (TTURC) and a consultant on the Transdisciplinary Prevention Research Center. Her published research focuses on the sociology of adolescent health, and includes studies of gender inequalities in physical activity and family characteristics influencing smoking. She received her doctorate from the Department of Sociology at USC in .

Paula H. Palmer

Paula Healani Palmer, Ph.D., is assistant professor of clinical preventive medicine, executive director of the Institute for Health Promotion & Disease Prevention Research, associate director of the USC Transdisciplinary Tobacco Use Research Center and coleader of the training core for the Transdisciplinary Drug Abuse Prevention Research Center. She is co-investigator of three school-based smoking prevention studies in California, Hawaii, and China that look at the impact of culture on smoking beliefs and practices. In addition, Palmer is coprincipal investigator and director of administration for the China Seven Cities Study. She received her baccalaureate from California State University, Fullerton in 1980, and her doctorate in Clinical Health Psychology from the California School of Professional Psychology in 1996.

Elahe Nezami

Elahe Nezami, Ph.D., is principal investigator of the TTURC pilot program Psychosocial Predictors of Smoking Across Cultures. As a research assistant professor of preventive medicine in the Keck School of Medicine, Dr. Nezami has focused her research on determinants of behavioral risk factors for chronic diseases—cancer and cardiovascular disease in particular. Risk factors of primary interest are tobacco use, physical activity, and nutritional practices. Her other research projects include examination of personality characteristics (hostility, anger, aggression) in relation to cardiovascular disease; the psychological predictors of smoking (depression, anxiety, novelty seeking); and the role of culture and acculturation in predicting behavior. Dr. Nezami received her masters of art degree in clinical psychology from the University of Houston and her doctorate in Clinical Psychology from the University of Southern California, in 1993.

Juana Mora

Juana Mora, Ph.D., is Professor of Chicana/o Studies at California State University at Northridge. She conducts community-based participatory research on the health of Hispanic children in California. She is the evaluator of several community-based health programs for children and teaches courses in Chicana/o Studies. She is the special assistant to the president of California Polytechnic University and associate editor of the Journal of Chicana/Latina Studies. She has served as a research analyst at the Los Angeles Health Department's Office of Alcohol Programs and as project director on several grants funded by the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism.