Background: Drug and alcohol addiction are often the subject of intense stigmatization. Stigmatization involves blaming the individual, usually for poor personal choices, lack of willpower, and/or a fundamental failing in their overall moral character. Rates of stigmatization are high not only among the general populace but “among all levels of care within healthcare settings.”[1] Although there are many medical tools for treating addiction, stigma hinders effective medical treatment in two ways. First, people are less likely to seek professional medical help if they feel they may be stigmatized. Second, if people do seek medical help, particularly from providers other than addiction specialists, then they may experience stigma that reduces their likelihood to follow treatment protocols and seek follow up help, particularly after a relapse. In order to reduce the stigma associated with drug addiction, we must first challenge the idea that it is entirely a phenomenon of individuals and individual failings.

Task: Using tools from the course, as well as the CDC resources below (found on Canvas), you should (1) construct an argument that explains why it is inaccurate to see addiction as simply individual failing, (2) propose and explain a better theoretical framework based on either a structuralist (Durkheim/House) or conflict theory (Marx/Weber) approach for understanding addiction, and (3) propose one or two research questions that function as hypotheses that would test your proposed theoretical approach.

Hedegaard, Holly, and Margaret Warner. “Drug Overdose Deaths in the United States, 1999–2020,” no. 428 (2021): 8.

Miniño., Arialdi. “Drug Poisoning Mortality, by State and Race and Ethnicity: United States, 2019.” National Center for Health Statistics, March 24, 2021.

Rossen, Lauren M (CDC/OPHSS/NCHS). “Drug Poisoning Mortality: United States, 1999–2016,” n.d., 31.