DAGNONI, Janine Marinho    GARCI, Agnaldo. Substance abuse, friendship and human development. Gerais, Rev. Interinst. Psicol. []. 2014, 7, 1, pp.17-26. ISSN 1983-8220.

Much has been studied about the influence of friends on the use and abuse of psychoactive substances, however, there is no definite conclusion on the subject. In this sense, the present work is relevant since its general goal is to investigate the network of friends at the beginning of the drug use and the present network of adolescent users under treatment in Psychosocial Alcohol and Drugs Mental Healthcare Center (CAPS-ad) of a country town at Bahia State (Brazil), to check the changes in the constitution and in the characteristics of these networks of friendship at the time of initial use and when they were interviewed. Thirteen teenagers (with an average of 16.6 years-old), users of CAPS-ad, answered a semi-structured questionnaire. Data were analyzed by descriptive, frequency and content aspects. The results suggest important trends of the relationship between substance abuse and friendship related to human development. The friendship in the world of drugs seems to differ by the performance on risk-related activities (stealing, drug traffic, etc.). The psychoactive substance users perceive the direct and indirect influence of friends in the beginning and during the maintenance of drug use and such use, on the other hand, seem to influence the friendships, reducing the number of friends up to restrict them to the family environment

: Substance Abuse; Friendship; Adolescence.

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