Substance Use and Abuse
Social Effects of Psychoactive Substance Use and Abuse

A psychoactive substance is any chemical that has the ability to impact the central nervous system and interfere with the way the brain functions. Stimulants (cocaine, dextroamphetamine, methamphetamine), sedatives (heroin, alcohol), and hallucinogens (psychoactive mushrooms, PCP) are some examples of psychoactive substances. Abusing psychoactive substances not only affects the user but it also impacts those who are around the user. The abuser’s close family members and friends are the most affected by psychoactive substance abuse. The individual's family, relationships, life, employment, education, personality, and health are adversely affected (Narvaez et al., 2015). There are various variables that will determine the extent to which each of these is affected. Some of the variables are a psychoactive substance used and the personality of the user. Social effects of abusing psychoactive substance are quite obscure, unlike psychological and physical effects. Psychoactive substance abuse does have a detrimental effect on society. The Department of Health and Human Services has indicated that there have been around 100,000 deaths that were linked to alcohol each year. These deaths are preventable and they do cost taxpayers a whopping $198 billion annually (Narvaez et al., 2015). Alcohol is one of the psychoactive substances that are legal, yet it has huge adverse effects if not taken in moderation.

Psychoactive substance abuse has been directly linked to crime rates. A majority of criminal offenders do abuse alcohol or other substances. This fact has been noted by the Justice Institute. 80% of crime in the United States is contributed by psychoactive substance abuse. Psychoactive substance use affects a person's brain and this inhibits their thinking, which makes them be easily manipulated into committing a crime. When a person has taken a psychoactive substance, they feel and act differently and this could be the reason for them to willingly participate in a crime. The continued use of psychoactive substance makes the nation an unsafe place to live and increases the fear that people have of certain neighborhoods. Prisons get overfilled with criminals who are minutely aware of the events of the crime they took part in and rehabilitation costs will fall on the taxpayers.

Isolation is what will face an individual who continuously uses psychoactive substances. this isolation is due to their behavior and lack of connection with family and friends. Family members will tend to withdraw from the individual especially if they are not substance users. Isolation will result in the individual seeking further...…a child to experiment with the drug. This could be out of curiosity and this curiosity might lead to dependency. Therefore, while researchers are trying to understand the correlation of genes, one should not ignore the impact of learned behaviors. Children will tend to mimic what they see their caregivers do, and when one is raised in an environment where parents smoke or drink alcohol, they are more likely to also partake in the same. Genetic predisposition is merely one of the aspects that could be used to predict the likelihood of a person forming an addiction.

All animals have the ability to associate a particular food with pleasure, which would make them addicted to that particular food. Addiction comes about in a similar manner. When a person begins liking something so much and they are associating the substance with pleasure they are likely to continue using the substance. This will, in the long run, lead to addiction. While genes have been shown to predispose a person to addiction, there are people who have been brought up by parents who are addicts and they did not become addicts themselves. Therefore, a person's coping skills do have a huge effect on a person's ability to resist addiction.