SUBSTANCE MISUSE

Substance Misuse

Abstract

Both international and British studies reveal very low rates of treatment utilization for substance abuse among young offenders despite very high problematic rates of substance abuse among this group. The current study reports on substance use patterns of a representative sample of 712 young offenders serving community orders with the Department of Juvenile Justice (UK) and their history of and attitudes toward treatment. Most (87%) young offenders had used marijuana, and 47% had used amphetamines in the last 12 months. One third of the sample reported problematic use of alcohol (being drunk at least weekly, on average). Forty-three percent reported that they engaged in crime to maintain their substance use. On the substance abuse scale of the Adolescent Psychopathology Scale—Short Form, 36.4% of the sample fell into the moderate to severe problem range. Despite such problems, treatment motivation was poor: 10% reported willingness to access treatment for their drug problems. Eighteen percent reported accessing some form of treatment in the past; the most common form of help seeking was approaching their family (12%). Self-reported access to other drug treatments was even lower, with the more intensive treatments revealing low rates of treatment completion. Despite almost 40% of the sample revealing significant substance abuse problems, referral for treatment was also low, with only 18% of the sample being offered an appointment with juvenile justice drug and alcohol workers. This study reveals the gap between awareness of problematic drug use and treatment-seeking behavior, and has implications for improving outreach to young offenders with substance abuse problems.

Chapter 1: Introduction

There is a strong association between substance abuse and juvenile offending (Dembo et al., 1991, Gordon et al., 2004, Hammersley et al., 2003, Newburn, 1998 and Yu & Williford, 1994). Several large-scale longitudinal studies of delinquency (Dembo et al., 1991, Loeber & Farrington, 2001 and Moffitt, 1997) highlight the important role of substance abuse, particularly early-onset abuse (Braithwaite et al., 2003, Gordon et al., 2004 and Loeber & Farrington, 2001), in the development of young offenders and the impact that substance abuse has in delaying the trajectory out of offending. The work of Moffitt (1997) on lifetime delinquency (as opposed to time-limited or adolescent-onset delinquency) reveals strong relationships between early deviance, substance use, and offending behavior. Various studies have demonstrated particular associations between these factors (e.g., Putnins, 2003 provided evidence from a brief screening instrument of detainees in a South British juvenile detention center that use of alcohol or inhalants at the time of initial arrest was a useful predictor of later criminal behavior, whereas the use of other illicit drugs did not predict engagement in criminal behavior postrelease). Trimboli and Coumarelos (1998) identified a dose-response relationship between cannabis and crime: The greater is the level of cannabis use, the greater is the frequency of crime. Hammersley et al. (2003) reported that more than 50% of their sample thought that their drug use was causal to their offending. The crime-substance abuse nexus suggests three possible pathways: substance abuse causes crime (presumably to afford drug ...