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Heroin Addiction and Related Clinical Problems: 2021, 23, N4 (pages: 5 - 14)

The effect of cognitive behaviour group therapy on drug dependence among heroin addicts in Taiwan: What roles do drug beliefs, drug craving, and intention to relapse play?

Lin M.-F., and Lang S.-Y.

Summary: Background: As soon as the sharing of needles to inject heroin became a common habit, AIDS started to become more prevalent, and Harm-Reduction Alternative Therapy was launched to solve the problem of HIV infection. Despite that initiative, the rate of heroin recidivism remained high for many years after the new policy was launched. After taking these premises into consideration, the present study was designed to test the effectiveness of treatment, besides using qualitative data to help explain the findings. A further aim has been to gain a better understanding of the role played by drug beliefs in drug dependence, so as to provide guidelines for treatment. Methods: The subjects included in this study were 82 heroin addicts who participated in 6 ½-month cognitive behaviour group therapy led by our research team. The tools comprised a collection of Drug Beliefs, Craving for Drugs, Intentional Relapse, and Severity of Dependence. SPSS statistical package software was used for repeated measurement ANOVA and regression analysis. Further use of qualitative analysis to help explain the findings of quantitative research and, lastly, the Sobel test was applied to confirm the intermediate effect. Results: 1) There were significant differences in drug beliefs, especially as regards the reduction of outcome expectations and underestimating the severity of drug addiction. 2) The study did not findmoderate effects, but it turned out that in the relationships between drug craving (Sobel test t=2.1733, p=.0297), emotional inducement (Sobel test t=2.1606, p=.0307) and drug dependence, underestimating drug addiction played a mediating role, with explanatory powers of 19% and 22.9%, respectively. Conclusions: The study found that underestimating drug addiction played a mediating role, which showed that long-term heroin addicts may display heroin dependence through an underestimation of their addiction.