Rat Park experiment upturns conventional wisdom about addiction
sub.garrytan.com
sub.garrytan.com
It turns out that, when you treat substance abuse as a symptom of an underlying problem and not a symptom of the substance itself (the same way we do for alcohol), you end up with a much more effective treatment strategy.
It's funny that it's taking us this long to come to that realization, when even the DSM IV outlines specific criteria for substance abuse and substance dependence, and most habitual users of drugs fit neither of these.
Funny anecdote: Szasz's "Rat Park" study originally appeared in a relatively unknown journal because it was rejected from all the mainstream ones for being "too much of a deviation" from the mainstream schools of thought.
I love how so many "well-meaning" people continue to often, apparently quite wilfully and in correspondence with their own perceived self-interest, turn a blind eye to those reasons.
I don't believe the study has anything to do with Thomas Szasz, although he may have used it as a supporting example in some of his writings. The study was conducted by Bruce Alexander and his collaborators, at Simon Fraser University in Canada.
"New" apparently now means "35 years old" ;)
Not just rats will avoid poison when there is an alternative and will consume it if nothing else to do.)
My intellectual curiosity is satisfied thanks