Substance Abuse Among Puerto Rican and Dominican Gang Members in a Small City Setting

Abstract

Joining a gang increases an adolescent's risk for substance abuse. To better understand the contextual development of drug use behavior, this retrospective ethnographic study describes a sample of 76 young small-city mainland Puerto-Rican and Dominican males who joined gangs when they were younger. Data is presented and discussed on the drug abuse behavior including their drug using progression and the context in which such use occurs. The young average age of onset 11.2 (sd = 2.6) combined with the rapid progression to more dangerous drugs, which generally occurs within six years, demonstrates the elevated risk associated with small city gang membership. Differences in the patterns of drug use were also found between the English and Spanish speaking groups. The authors discuss the implications of the study findings on the development of interventions. Recommendations address future research possibilities on drug abuse within Latino gangs.

Different Strokes for Different Gangs? An Analysis of Capital among Latino and Asian Gang Members

“…The current study is based on the comparison of data collected on two ethnically diverse samples of gang members from two previously published studies on the behavior of gang members (De la Rosa, Rugh, and Rojas 2005; Pih and Mao 2005). The first sample comprises Latino gang members, primarily of Puerto Rican and Dominican descent, in Lawrence, Massachusetts.…”