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Some social meanings of tranquilizer use
Author(s) -
Cooperstock Ruth,
Lennard Henry L.,
Cooperstock Ruth,
Lennard Henry L.
Publication year - 1979
Publication title -
sociology of health and illness
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.146
H-Index - 97
eISSN - 1467-9566
pISSN - 0141-9889
DOI - 10.1111/1467-9566.ep11007101
Subject(s) - tranquilizer , wife , medical prescription , psychology , variety (cybernetics) , exploratory research , developmental psychology , social psychology , clinical psychology , psychiatry , psychotherapist , medicine , sociology , pharmacology , social science , computer science , political science , artificial intelligence , law
Summary With approximately 20 per cent of all prescriptions written for psychotropic drugs, a large proportion of which are tranquilizers, it becomes necessary to examine the consequences of such use and the functions served by these drugs in social as well as pharmacological terms. This paper reports data from an exploratory study of the social and behavioural effects of use based on group interviews with current and former tranquilizer users. It adopts a natural history approach. The informants reflected the age and sex distribution of tranquilizer users generally, predominantly female and middle‐aged. The thematic material dealt largely with a variety of role conflicts. Discussion focussed on these conflicts and the individual's ability to perform expected roles or adapt to them. Among females the roles included those of wife, mother, and houseworker, while males primarily discussed tranquilizer use as a means of controlling somatic symptoms in order to perform their occupational role. The function of tranquilizers in maintaining the individual in a dependent patient role was also discussed by a number of informants. This study demonstrates the inadequacy of the biomedical model of disease in explaining continued tranquiliser use.