Alfred R. Lindesmith
Alfred R. Lindesmith | |
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Born | Indiana University | August 3, 1905
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Alfred Ray Lindesmith (August 3, 1905 – February 14, 1991) was an
Lindesmith's interest in drugs began at the University of Chicago, where he was trained in social psychology by Herbert Blumer and Edwin Sutherland, earning his doctorate in 1937. His education there was a mixture of the methodological and theoretical, a balance that would later appear in his drug studies. The work at Chicago involved research with interactionist theory, including the research of Chicago's Herbert Blumer, emphasizing the idea of self-concept in human interaction.
Theory of addiction
Lindesmith's work on drugs began with his questioning of the nature of addiction in a 1938 essay entitled "A
As this work progressed, it developed into a full theoretical and empirical account of the nature of opiate addiction, culminating in his book Opiate Addictions in 1947 (republished as Addiction and Opiates in 1968).
What Lindesmith developed was an account of opiate addiction that (1) distinguished between the physical reactions of narcotic withdrawal and its psychological (phenomenological) experience, and (2) described the relationship between these two phenomena and addiction. Addressing the question of why regular users of opiates do not necessarily become dependent or addicted, he found that, while continuous opiate use does cause many to experience physical withdrawal, the impact of withdrawal on the likelihood of dependence and addiction is not certain. Lindesmith's "addicts" revealed this, in part, as did general reports from individuals who, despite regular use of opiates, failed to become habitual users, stressing "the advantage of attributing the origin of addiction, not to a single event, but to a series of events, thus implying that addiction is established in a learning process extending over a period of time."
This learning process has two parts. First, opiate users must connect their drug withdrawal to their use of the drug, which is something that individuals exposed to opiates in hospital settings are more likely to do. When withdrawal is interpreted as a form of addiction, the perceived (and felt) need for more drugs grows. More recent research has shown that, because hospital patients often associate opiate analgesia with an illness and/or hospital care, and because the drugs cause sedation and other mind-altering effects, patients rarely experience any withdrawal.
Here is the second part of the equation: if and when an opiate user identifies opiate withdrawal as such, he or she must initiate a ritual activity that is a physiological, cognitive, and behavioral mixture. As Richard DeGrandpre writes in The Cult of Pharmacology,[2] "the opiate user must first experience withdrawal (a physical phenomenon), he or she must develop a concern over the withdrawal experience as such (a cognitive phenomenon), and then he or she must engage in drug use, taking opiates repeatedly to eliminate or avoid opiate withdrawal (a behavioral phenomenon). A breakdown in any part of this bio-psycho-social circuit can keep a pattern of dependent opiate use from emerging."
In Robert Scharse's study of
As his career ended, Lindesmith held on to his belief that opiate addiction is not the simple product of one's exposure to opiates. Rather it is the result of a dramatic shift in a person's mental and motivational state. Once the individual concludes that he or she is hooked, it rarely occurs to them that they are engaging in a self-fulfilling prophecy, trapped within a belief that makes the experience exactly what it is feared to be.
While Lindesmith's theory retains its canonical importance, it has been subject to several serious critiques. Lindesmith's theory of opiate addiction cannot explain relapse after physiological withdrawal symptoms have ceased and, more fundamentally, it relies on an outdated division of human perception into: (1) brute biological sensations the body passively experiences in immediate response to its physical environment, and (2) the mind's active and deliberate interpretation of those sensations. In short, Lindesmith's reliance on Herbert Blumer's voluntaristic understanding of meaning and interpretation profoundly undermined his capacity to theorize addiction as a loss of self-control, or as something suffered rather than chosen (Weinberg 1997).[3] For a debate of this critique see (Galliher 1998,[4] Weinberg 1998[5]).
War on drugs
The fact that Lindesmith's work threatened the emerging demonization of heroin, etc., is clear from how the
In his book The Addict and the Law,[7] Lindesmith presents a detailed account of U.S. laws, regulations, police practices and court procedures, often in painful detail. He was describing what we now know as the beginning of the "war on drugs", although that term was not coined until 1971. It was published just 3 years after Anslinger retired. In his book, Lindesmith expressed hope that the relatively liberal drug policies of the Kennedy and Johnson Administrations would continue, but that was not to be.
Criticism
Professor
Lindesmith wrote his earlier books from close personal interviews with a very limited number of addicts, about 50, almost all of them victims of therapeutic use of drugs when they were in health care for other reasons. Bejerot agreed with Lindesmith that these therapeutic addicts could be treated as personal health problems. These addicts were often ashamed of their drug abuse and the risk that they should introduce others in drug addiction was low. Bejerot claimed that persons from other, much larger, groups of drug addicts often were those that introduced others in their habit to use drugs (Bejerot studied this issue in his doctor thesis about persons who injected amphetamine). Bejerot claimed that the liberal drug laws that Lindesmith recommended – neglecting smaller amounts of illegal drugs for personal use etc. – therefore would open the doors for a much larger drug epidemic. Then, the society will rebound with much more restrictive laws (compare with the War on drugs).[10][12]
Personal life
Lindesmith was born in
Lindesmith married Gertrude Louise Augusta Wollaeger (1907–1985) in 1930. They had one daughter, Karen Lindesmith. He died in Bloomington, Indiana.
In 1929, he was a professor and head football coach at the University of Wisconsin–Stevens Point.[14]
Head coaching record
Year | Team | Overall | Conference | Standing | Bowl/playoffs | ||||
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Stevens Point Pointers (Wisconsin State Teachers College Conference) (1929) | |||||||||
1929 | Stevens Point | 0–6 | 0–4 | 10th | |||||
Stevens Point: | 0–6 | 0–4 | |||||||
Total: | 0–6 |
References
- ISBN 978-0-7914-4393-4.
- ^ R. DeGrandpre, The Cult of Pharmacology: How America Became the World's Most Troubled Drug Culture. Durham: Duke University Press (2006).
- ^ Weinberg, Darin. 1997. "Lindesmith on Addiction: A Critical History of a Classic Theory." Sociological Theory. 15(2): 150–161
- ^ Galliher, John. 1998. "Comment on Weinberg's 'Lindesmith on Addiction'." Sociological Theory. 16(2): 205–206
- ^ Weinberg, Darin. 1998. "Praxis and Addiction: A Reply to Galliher." Sociological Theory. 16(2): 207–208
- ^ John F. Galliher, David P. Keys, Michael Elsner, "Lindesmith v. Anslinger: An Early Government Victory in the Failed War on Drugs." The Journal of Criminal Law and Criminology, Vol. 88, No. 2 (Winter, 1998), pp. 661–682
- ^ A.R. Lindesmith, The Addict and the Law. Bloomington: Indiana University Press (1965).
- ^ "Nils Bejerot: Narkotika och Narkomani, 1975". Archived from the original on 2017-02-21. Retrieved 2008-04-08.
- ^ Rachel Lart BRITISH MEDICAL PERCEPTION FROM ROLLESTON TO BRAIN, CHANGING IMAGES OF THE ADDICT AND ADDICTION Archived 2012-10-16 at the Wayback Machine
- ^ a b "Nils Bejerot & Jonas Hartelius Missbruk och motåtgärder, 1984" (PDF). Archived from the original (PDF) on 2007-10-10. Retrieved 2008-04-14.
- ^ "DRUG ADDICTION (2nd Brain Report) | Second Brain Report". Archived from the original on 2011-09-27. Retrieved 2011-08-30.
- ^ "Nils Bejerot:Narkotikafrågan och samhället, Stockholm, 1967,1969" (PDF). Archived from the original (PDF) on 2007-09-27. Retrieved 2010-05-06.
- ISBN 1-56000-082-1; Rootsweb.com; the Birth Certificates Index of the Minnesota Historical Society; the 1910 U.S. Census; and the web sites of the Owatonna Alumni Association Archived 2010-07-04 at the Wayback Machine and the Society for the Study of Social Problems.
- ^ The Iris (PDF). epapers.uwsp.edu. 1930. Retrieved February 8, 2018.