Perception of hallucinogen use risks and associated hallucinogen use in the United States: results from a large national sample

ABSTRACT

Background

Our research hypothesis suggests that individuals who perceived hallucinogens as a high-risk substance may have lower odds of using hallucinogens.

Methods

Data were extracted from three waves (2017–2019) of the National Survey of Drug Use and Health. Two measurements evaluating perception of hallucinogen use risks were selected: risk trying LSD once or twice (unweighted n = 61,982) and risk using LSD once or twice a week (unweighted n = 23,734). Multivariable logistic regressions were estimated following propensity score matching.

Results

Respondents who thought trying LSD once or twice may bring moderate to great risks to human health were less likely to use LSD (adjusted odds ratio [AOR] = 0.19, 95% CI: 0.17, 0.21; p < .01) and other types of hallucinogens (AOR = 0.26, 95% CI: 0.24, 0.27; p < .01). Respondents who thought using LSD once or twice per week may bring moderate to great risks to human health also were less likely to use LSD (AOR = 0.27, 95% CI: 0.24, 0.31; p < .01) and other types of hallucinogens (AOR = 0.36, 95% CI: 0.31, 0.40; p < .01).

Conclusions

The empirical evidence from this research suggests that perceptions of hallucinogen use risks were associated with the actual hallucinogen use.

KEYWORDS:

• Perception of substance use
• hallucinogens
• National Survey of Drug Use and Health
• illicit drug

Ethical approval

The authors of this present research only used publicly available and secondary data without identifiable information from the National Survey on Drug Use and Health. Therefore, this research did not fall into the category of human subject research.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Funding

The author(s) reported that there is no funding associated with the work featured in this article.