Characteristics and social representation of ecstasy in Europe - Irefrea

to the middle and upper classes. The greatest difference between the samples is in thedegree of family emancipation. The differences are enormous. In Palma de Mallorca,71% live with their parents, a percentage which drops to 19% in the Utrecht sampleThese differences are equally perceptible in other variables such as source of funds,being employed, etc. We believe these differences in family dependency respond todifferent sociological situations between the cities and must be taken into account at thetime of designing prevention strategies.It is interesting that the differences in weekly spending on entertainment are not verydifferent (around 25 ECU) in spite of the differences in monthly disposable incomeamong young people in one city from another, which may be more than double. TheNice sample spends significantly more, but it is also the one that earns more.In all the cities, the relationships between the respondents and their parents are verygood or good with the exception of Coimbra which shows a higher percentage ofindividuals who consider relationships with their parents as “neither good nor bad”(49.4%) even if, later, it is the only sample which does not have a single individual whoconsiders his relationship with his parents to be “very bad”). We consider these results tobe very valuable, since at the level of all the cities, family relationships function reasonablywell. This suggests that preventive strategies based on family relationships must be apriority in those countries where young people stays at parents house after eighteen yearsold, such as Spain, Portugal and Italy, since there exists a good basis for communication.This opportunity of mobilising the family as a preventive component is obviouslyincreased in these countries with a greater economic dependency on their families. Wemust not forget that people using ecstasy had also good relationship with their families,but, in a significative way, consumers have worse relationship with their parents.CHARACTERISTICS OF ECSTASY CONSUMPTIONThe data which this part of the survey gives us; a) they have meaning in themselvesfor giving us descriptive information on consumption characteristics in differentEuropean cities, on the use of a substance which has still not been very studied, and b)these quantitative data serve to locate and allow the analysis of social representation ofconsumers and non-consumers of ecstasy.By definition, half the study are non-consumers (NC). There are differences in thefrequencies of use between the different samples of consumers (C). In general, in theCoimbra and Utrecht samples, there are less users in the higher frequencies of use. Thestarting age fluctuates between 18 years of age (Modena) and 21,45 (Utrecht) so that ithas not yet become a first step to taking drugs unlike cannabis whose consumptionstarts earlier. The greater part of the C group consumes between 1 and 2 tablets ofecstasy on each occasion. It is by preference a weekend use although in three samples(Modena, Nice and Utrecht), there is a midweek use by more than 20%.Ecstasy consumers are veritable poly-consumers. Considering use during thepreceding month, a minimum of 72% (Utrecht) had used cannabis but this percentage184