title: Ready for Retirement: The Gateway Drug Hypothesis.
abstract: The psycho-social observation that the use of some psychoactive substances ("drugs") is often followed by the use of other and more problematic drugs has given rise to a cluster of so-called "gateway drug hypotheses," and such hypotheses have often played an important role in developing drug use policy. The current essay suggests that drug use policies that have drawn on versions of the hypothesis have involved an unjustified oversimplification of the dynamics of drug use, reflecting the interests of certain stakeholders rather than wise social policy. The hypothesis should be retired.
authors.affiliation: a Department of Criminal Justice , John Jay College of Criminal Justice , CUNY , New York , USA.|b Centre for Applied Philosophy and Public Ethics , Charles Sturt University , Canberra , Australia.
authors.forename: John
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Kleinig
mesh_terms: D018450:Disease Progression; D006291:Health Policy; D006801:Humans; D013287:Illicit Drugs; D008385:Marijuana Smoking / Q000453:epidemiology; D011582:Psychological Theory; D015203:Reproducibility of Results; D019966:Substance-Related Disorders / Q000453:epidemiology / Q000517:prevention & control
chemical_list: D013287:Illicit Drugs
keywords: Jr.; Robert L. DuPont; criminalization; dependency; drug use policy; gateway drug hypothesis; gateway metaphor; licit-illicit distinction; marijuana