Deliberate metallic paint inhalation and cultural marginality: paint sniffing among acculturating central California youth.

Deliberate metallic paint inhalation, paint sniffing, has recently become the focus of community concern in central California, as numbers of recalcitrant young abusers have entered the overloaded Mental Health and Juvenile Justice systems. This study, based on an extension of psychological, sociological and anthropological explanations of inhalant abuse, describes the adolescent paint sniffer and proposes that a combination of interacting factors both differentiates him/her from other-drug abusing youth, and predisposes him/her to inhalant use. The experimental hypothesis was tested by a stepwise discriminant analysis performed on 50 subjects, equally divided into two groups, paint and other-drug. Six variables, in combination, were found to significantly differentiate the groups, and the derived function accounted for 56% of the between group differences. The following conclusions can be drawn from this investigation. Firstly, the adolescent paint sniffer is demonstrably and meaningfully different as discriminated by a combination of personal, familial and sociocultural variables. Secondly, these identified factors have predisposed the sniffer to abuse, and cannot be considered simply the consequence of said abuse. Finally, it can be concluded that the paint sniffer is a youth disengaged from the symbols and traditions of his/her culture of origin and concomitantly rejected by the majority culture. Inhalant intoxication provides a "cheap" and effective escape from his/her isolation. Recommendations for prevention, early intervention and treatment are addressed.