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Environmental effects on drug use

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Abstract

It is often assumed that the emotion-altering effects of drugs are the major reasons for their use and, more specifically, that drugs are used to compensate for undesired emotional states produced by various events and environments. The present paper explicitly states one version of this point of view, based on a descriptive system for emotional states and hypotheses regarding preferred and unpreferred emotional states. The emotional impact of various stimulant and depressant drugs is reviewed and the emotional impact of various types of environments is described. Also, the emotional predispositions associated with personality (temperament) are noted. Finally, specific hypotheses are derived to show which drugs are most likely to be used in different, environmentally induced or temperament-associated, emotional states.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Psychology, University of California, 90024, Los Angeles, California

    Albert Mehrabian

Authors
  1. James A. Russell
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  2. Albert Mehrabian
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Additional information

This study was supported by Grant AA 1874 to Albert Mehrabian from the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism.

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Russell, J.A., Mehrabian, A. Environmental effects on drug use. J Nonverbal Behav 2, 109–123 (1977). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF01145827

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