Societal images of Cannabis use: comparing three countries

Compared to Finnish and Swedish respondents, Canadians were both more likely to have tried Cannabis and to view Cannabis as a less serious problem for society.These findings emphasize the extent to which views about Cannabis can vary. It is possible that views about Cannabis are, at least in part, a social construction influenced by media, social policy and exposure to the drug that varies from country to country.Peoples’ beliefs about Cannabis appear to be related to the way the drug is presented in the media and treated by the legal system [1]. Comparing societal beliefs about Cannabis between different countries can reveal inconsistencies in the way that this drug is viewed. These comparisons have the potential to highlight how beliefs about a drug do not result solely from the experience of using Cannabis itself by illustrating how different societies can have different attitudes towards this same illicit substance. This paper will explore this issue using a recently collected set of general population surveys in Canada, Sweden, and Finland that were constructed to assess views on various addictions using a similar set of items.This study uses a cross-national data set to compare perceptions of addictions as a societal problem in Canada, Sweden, Finland and St. Petersburg, Russia [2,3]. Because the Russian survey did not ask questions about Cannabis use, findings for this substance were not reported as part of the previous country comparisons. The current analysis employed the random population surveys from Finland (n？=？740), Sweden (n？=？1098), and Canada (n？=？864). Details of the surveys can be found elsewhere [2] but briefly, the Canadian survey was a random digit dialing survey with a response rate of 41% and the Finnish and Swedish surveys were mailed surveys with response rates of 37% and 55% respectively. Respondents on all surveys were asked a series of questions starting with an item that asked them to rate on a scale from 1 (not at all serious) to 10 (e