O'Gorman, Aileen (2016) Chillin, buzzin, getting mangled, and coming down: Doing differentiated normalisation in risk environments. Drugs: Education Prevention and Policy, 23, (3), pp. 247-254. DOI:10.1080/09687637.2016.1176991.
Aims: This paper examines differentiated normalisation through the lens of young drug users from a marginalised Dublin neighbourhood where drugs are readily available, prevalence rates are high, and a flourishing drugs market operates.
Findings: The narratives of these marginalised young people illustrate how drug use and drug choices are shaped by different intentions, avowed identities and diverse structural, temporal and socio-spatial settings. Their routines and drug repertoires echo the (mainly) reasoned consumption choices, the cost–benefit analyses and the emphasis on pleasure and fun ascribed to recreational drug users, including those who underpin the normalisation concept. However, their drug using practices continue to be rendered deviant due to their experience of social exclusion; exclusion from consumption-orientated lifestyles and from the night time economy; and their inclusion in the informal drugs economy.
Conclusion: Normalisation is relative (not just differentiated) to the social status of the drug user. A reconstructed normalisation thesis inclusive of class (and race, and gender) could explore why the use of similar drugs and similar drug using behaviours by different social groups is differentially accommodated and accepted by mainstream society.
A Substance use and dependence > Personal history of substance use (pathway) > Initiation
F Concepts in psychology > Behaviour > Risk-taking behaviour
J Health care, prevention, harm reduction and treatment > Risk and protective factors > Risk factors
J Health care, prevention, harm reduction and treatment > Risk and needs assessment > Risk assessment
L Social psychology and related concepts > Social context > Context encouraging substance use
MA-ML Social science, culture and community > Social condition > Poverty / deprivation
MM-MO Crime and law > Criminality > Youth (juvenile) offending
T Demographic characteristics > Adolescent / youth (teenager / young person)
VA Geographic area > Europe > Ireland > Dublin
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