Temperance Culture and the Repression of Scientific Inquiry Into Illegal Drug‐Altered States of Consciousness

Abstract

American scientific inquiry into the understandings of drug‐altered states of consciousness is underdeveloped primarily because government regulations embedded within a temperance culture has repressed it. Despite preliminary evidence of the therapeutic value of altered states of consciousness associated with the use of illegal drugs to both physical and mental health, science has been able to do little to understand this potential. Within this essay, we examine the influence of this temperance culture on government regulations and its impingement on scientific practice in the study of illegal drug‐altered states of consciousness as the explanation for much of the failure of science to adequately explore these lines of inquiry. Much of our analysis is based upon examples from research in the area of alcohol studies, as the temperance movement arose primarily in response to this particular drug.

Keywords:

• Drugs
• Altered States of Consciousness
• Government Control of Drug Research
• Temperance Culture

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Michael R. Nusbaumer

Michael R. Nusbaumer is at Indiana University‐Purdue University at Fort Wayne; and Denise M. Reiling is at Eastern Michigan University.