Department of Sociology, University of Zürich, Zürich, Switzerland.
Experimental Pharmacopsychology and Psychological Addiction Research, Department of Adult Psychiatry and Psychotherapy, University Hospital of Psychiatry Zürich, University of Zürich, Zürich, Switzerland; Neuroscience Center Zürich, ETH Zürich and University of Zürich, Zürich, Switzerland.
Biol Psychiatry Cogn Neurosci Neuroimaging. 2024 Oct;9(10):1058-1065. doi: 10.1016/j.bpsc.2024.06.014. Epub 2024 Jul 14.
Substance use disorders are associated with severe negative social and health-related outcomes. Evidence has accumulated that long-term substance use is associated with alterations in social interaction behavior, which likely contributes to the vicious cycle of substance use disorder. However, little is known about whether these social problems originate from contextual factors only or also from the substance use itself-in other words, if they are predisposed or substance induced.
We studied the causation behind behavioral alterations of substance users over a 9-year period (ages 11-20 years) in an urban age cohort (N = 1002) with a high prevalence of substance use at age 20. We identified common substance use patterns using toxicological hair analysis, examined behavioral alterations with incentivized games, and used teacher assessments across different ages to determine the causes and effects that underlie substance use-related impairments in social interaction.
We found that opioid and stimulant users showed reduced prosocial behavior compared with nonusers, particularly in interpersonal trust and perspective taking (e.g., they were approximately 50% less likely to trust others). Our longitudinal analyses suggest a causal relationship between the nonmedical use of prescription opioids and impaired social behavior, whereas impairments among stimulant users seem to be partially predisposed. Moreover, women tended to be more severely affected by opioid use than men. However, no behavioral alterations were found among young adult cannabis or ecstasy users.
Highly addictive substances such as opioids can impair users' social behavior by undermining fundamental human interaction, thereby fueling a vicious cycle of substance use and social isolation.
物质使用障碍与严重的负面社会和健康相关后果有关。有证据表明，长期物质使用与社交互动行为的改变有关，这可能导致物质使用障碍的恶性循环。然而，人们对这些社交问题是仅源于环境因素还是也源于物质使用本身（换句话说，它们是预先存在的还是物质诱导的）知之甚少。
我们在一个城市年龄队列（N=1002）中研究了物质使用者行为改变的原因，该队列在 20 岁时物质使用的患病率很高，研究时间跨度为 9 年（11-20 岁）。我们使用毒理学毛发分析来识别常见的物质使用模式，通过激励游戏来检查行为改变，并使用不同年龄段的教师评估来确定物质使用相关社交互动障碍的原因和影响。
我们发现，与非使用者相比，阿片类药物和兴奋剂使用者表现出较少的亲社会行为，特别是在人际信任和换位思考方面（例如，他们信任他人的可能性大约低 50%）。我们的纵向分析表明，非医疗使用处方阿片类药物与社交行为受损之间存在因果关系，而兴奋剂使用者的受损似乎部分是预先存在的。此外，女性受阿片类药物使用的影响似乎比男性更严重。然而，在年轻的大麻或摇头丸使用者中没有发现行为改变。
像阿片类药物这样的高度成瘾物质会通过破坏基本的人际互动来损害使用者的社交行为，从而加剧物质使用和社会隔离的恶性循环。
