Why do people use alcohol and other drugs?

The feelings people experience when taking a certain drug plays a major role in their decision to use it. Some substances might be used only for specific occasions. For example, people often use ecstasy and amphetamines to increase their energy during a dance party.⁸ Another person may use performance and image enhancing drugs, such as steroids, or cognitive enhancers to improve their performance at work, study or sporting competitions. Others may turn to alcohol and tobacco to relax after work or to combat stress.^9,10

Availability can be a major factor determining whether people use a specific drug. The greater the level of supply of a drug in a society, the more likely it is to be used, and the more likely people are to experience problems with it.¹¹

The widespread availability of alcohol is one of the reasons it is the most commonly-used drugs and creates such significant harms.

Drugs such as heroin and amphetamines are less likely to be used because they are illegal, making them more difficult to obtain.⁵ Even within the illicit drug market, availability plays a major role. Supplies of heroin and ecstasy have fluctuated in the past two decades for a number of reasons, including stronger law enforcement restricting supplies of the drugs.^7,12

Price is also a major influence and is closely linked with availability. Drugs that are available in high quantities tend to be cheaper to buy, and lower drug prices may result in higher levels of drug consumption and drug-related harm.^13,14

The cheaper the price, the more likely it is that the drug will appeal to more people.

For example, an oversupply of heroin in the 1990s saw prices drop to a historic low, resulting in it becoming the most-commonly injected drug¹⁵. Conversely, tougher law enforcement policies combined with lower profit margins made Australia a less attractive option for heroin traffickers, which led to the heroin drought in the early 2000s. This shortage saw the price skyrocket from $360 to $1200 per gram in Australia.¹⁴

The price of one drug can affect the demand for another. If the price rises too high, in some cases people who use a particular drug may seek a cheaper alternative if they can no longer afford their preferred choice.¹⁶

The purity of a drug refers to the strength or amount of the active ingredient. While a person’s individual perception of purity can be influenced by their tolerance levels and frequency of use, the actual purity of a drug can be impacted by the external market forces that affect its availability.

For example, the popularity of ecstasy fell in 2010 when international restrictions on the chemicals needed to make the drug saw its purity levels drop significantly. Although ecstasy demand is on the rise again, many people had already switched to using the synthetic compounds, which had been introduced as a substitute when ecstasy’s availability and purity levels had fallen.⁶

Initial reports suggest the shift around 2013 to the more potent form of crystal methamphetamine (ice) from the more traditional powder methamphetamine form (speed) may be linked to the higher purity of crystal methamphetamine. This also means the effects of the drug are much stronger.³

1. Ritter, A., King, T., & Hamilton, M. A. (Eds.). (2013). Drug use in Australian Society. Oxford University Press.
2. National Council on Alcoholism and Drug Dependence, Inc. (n.d.) Alcohol and Drug Information.
3. Australian Institute of Health and Welfare. (2016). National Drug Strategy Household Survey detailed report 2015. Canberra: AIHW.
4. Australian Drug Foundation (2000). Drugs in Focus: Dealing with drug issues for 9 to 14-year-olds. West Melbourne: ADF.
5. Brands, B., Sproule, B., & Marshman, J. (1998). Drugs and drug abuse. Addiction Research Foundation. Toronto, Canada.
6. Jadidi, N., & Nakhaee, N. (2014). Etiology of Drug Abuse: A Narrative Analysis. Journal of addiction, 2014.
7. Degenhardt, L., Reuter, P., Collins, L., & Hall, W. (2005). Evaluating explanations of the Australian ‘heroin shortage’. Addiction, 100(4), 459–469.
8. Ritter, A., King, T., & Hamilton, M. A. (Eds.). (2004). Drug use in Australia: preventing harm. Oxford University Press.
9. Urban, K. R., & Gao, W. J. (2014). Performance enhancement at the cost of potential brain plasticity: neural ramifications of nootropic drugs in the healthy developing brain. Frontiers in systems neuroscience, 8.
10. Wan, W., Weatherburn, D., Wardlaw, G., Sarafidis, V. & Sara, G. (2014). Supply-side reduction policy and drug-related harm.
11. Gossop, M. (2000). Living with drugs. Ashgate Publishing, Ltd.
12. Scott, L., & Burns, L. (2011). Has ecstasy peaked? A look at the Australian ecstasy market over the past eight years. EDRS drug trends bulletin, April.
13. Angell, M. P., Chester, N., Green, D., Somauroo, J., Whyte, G., & George, K. (2012). Anabolic steroids and cardiovascular risk. Sports medicine, 42(2), 119–134.
14. Degenhardt, L. J., Conroy, E., Gilmour, S., & Hall, W. D. (2005). The effect of a reduction in heroin supply on fatal and non-fatal drug overdoses in New South Wales, Australia. Medical Journal of Australia, 182(1), 20–23.
15. Jofre-Bonet, M., & Petry, N. M. (2008). Trading apples for oranges?: Results of an experiment on the effects of Heroin and Cocaine price changes on addicts’ polydrug use. Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, 66(2), 281–311.
16. Nauert, R. (2015). Alcohol & many medications make a risky mix.