Marijuana Use and Social Control: A Sociological Perspective on Deviance

Drug use must be understood within the larger context of deviance. Certainly, the tendency to examine drug use in isolation from the more general study of delinquent behavior requires redress. By definition, illicit drug use is delinquent behavior. In the present paper, a theory of delinquent behavior is applied to marijuana use. A powerful explanation of marijuana use is offered by this modified version of social control theory.