Habilidades sociais em adolescentes usuários de maconha

• Ano de defesa: 2007
• Autor(a) principal: Wagner, Marcia Fortes
• Orientador(a): Oliveira, Margareth da Silva
• Tipo de documento: Dissertação
• Tipo de acesso: Acesso aberto
• Idioma: por
• Instituição de defesa: Pontifícia Universidade Católica do Rio Grande do Sul; Porto Alegre
• Palavras-chave em Português: PSICOLOGIA CLÍNICA; PSICOLOGIA DO ADOLESCENTE; ADOLESCENTES - USO DE DROGAS; MACONHA; COMPORTAMENTO (PSICOLOGIA)
• Link de acesso: http://hdl.handle.net/10923/4906

The use of drugs is a very frequent phenomenon during adolescence, due to the characteristic vulnerability of the phase, when the individual has not properly developed some important skills yet. As it is a developmental stage that involves adaptations and changes, it can trigger the onset of behavioral, social, and psychological disorders, including disorder due to drug ingestion. According to researches, cannabis is the most widely used illicit drug, being male adolescents the heaviest users. There may be social skills deficits in disorders caused by cannabis use, such as low social competency and specific difficulties: facing situations that threaten self-esteem and solving problems. This study aims to contribute to scientific knowledge based on the understanding of social interaction behaviors in our reality. It aims to compare social skills in adolescents who use or are depended on cannabis with adolescents who do not make use of cannabis. This essay has two studies: a literature review and an empirical study. The literature review presents an overview of social skills in adolescent cannabis users, with a search conducted in the following databases: Pschynfo, Web of Science, Cochrane Library, Proquest, Medline e Lilacs, from 1996 to 2006. The English descriptors used were: social skills, social skills training, social competence, assertiveness, adolescents, teenagers, substance abuse, drug abuse, cannabis and marijuana. The Portuguese descriptors used were: habilidades sociais, treinamento em habilidades sociais, assertividade, adolescentes, abuso de substâncias, drogas and maconha. Books and papers, which were not found in the indexed references, were also used. Studies, mostly in English, point to social deficits, mainly to the difficulty in resisting or refusing drugs.Most studies also conclude that enhancing skills to resist drug offers, self-efficacy, and developing decision-making capacity, can reduce drug ingestion. Few Brazilian studies focusing on this topic were found. The empirical study aimed at evaluating the social skills of adolescent cannabis users and comparing them to non-users in order to identify whether there is a higher social skill deficit among drug users. The following instruments were used: Socio-demographic data form, Structured clinical interview for DSM-IV; Social Skills Inventory – SSI; Cognitive Screening - WISC-III and WAIS-III; Beck Depression Inventory-BDI and Beck Anxiety Inventory- BAI. The total sample consisted of 98 adolescents, subdivided into two groups, 49 cannabis users and 49 noncannabis users, with ages between 15 and 22 years old, and minimum schooling of 5 years. It was a quantitative, observational, and transversal comparative study between two groups: cannabis users and non-cannabis users. Results show significant differences in the cognitive screening and in the presence of anxiety and depression symptoms, with more harm to cannabis users. Final findings indicate that there were no significant statistical differences in SSI results between users and non-users. However, significant differences were found regarding two (2) out of the five (5) SSI factors. Cannabis users showed more impaired performance on Factor-4] Self-exposition to unknown people and new situations, and on Factor 5 ], Aggression self-control in adverse situations. This study concludes that adolescent cannabis users present more deficits in social skills than non-users.