© Borgis - New Medicine 2/2007, s. 31-36
*Vingender István
Cultural representation of the social body, and its relation with physical activity and drug consumption.
Based on an empirical survey among polish, ukrainian and hungarian youngsters
Semmelweis University Faculty of Health Care
Department of Social Studies on Medicine and Addictology
Summary
Summary
The issue for us is how young people use, understand, think and interpret their own social bodies which are represented in their social roles, rules and needs. We suppose that the social body is not a segregated phenomenon; on the contrary, it has a strong connection with some behavioural and cognitive aspects of social life.
In the research supporting our presentation we followed the hypothesis that the social representation of the body takes effect in physical activity habits, sports behaviour and drug consumption. We assume that the social body – the way young people use their bodies, how they understand what social and cultural roles they apply to their bodies, what connection exists between their sex and gender, and finally the way their bodies become an instrument for their social carrier – is an important factor causing drug consumption.
An empirical survey was conducted to explore these questions. The young people were randomly chosen for the questionnaire. Whole classes were surveyed and after sampling the correct proportions were weighted. Mainly young people interested in sports, at least in relaxing physical activities, were involved in the sample of the research. The data were analyzed by the SPSS 14.1 statistical program.
In the results we found that no linear and manifest connections can be observed between the social body, sports activity and drug consumption. At least these relations are not significant according to the statistical methods [paired sample t-test, ANOVA, chi-square]. The deeper analyses, however, showed that the social body and sports activity indeed explain coefficients of drug consumption [stepwise regression]. Moreover we were able to establish that there are several segregated groups of young people around these behaviour patterns. We found a significant correlation between several factors [with rotated factor analysis].
We can conclude that the social body representation, physical activity habits and drug consumption compose a coherent system of behaviour. These forms of behaviour define each other. The new element is that the social body refines the ´traditional´ relation between sports and drugs. It enters the relation of sports and drug use, and becomes a catalyst between them. So the drug consumption of adolescents even if interested in sports becomes more detailed and ´well-established´.
In the past 15 years several analytical empirical studies have been made on the topic of adolescents´ drug use in collaboration between the Department of Social Sciences, Faculty of Health Sciences, and the Department of Psychology, Faculty of Physical Education and Sports Sciences, both at Semmelweis University in Budapest. After examining family, school, contemporary community, consumption, relaxation and many other background factors, we turned our attention to a very important phenomenon of postmodern society and its young subculture, which is the social and cultural representation of the body. The most important issue for us is how young people use, understand, think and interpret their own social bodies which are represented in their social roles, rules and needs. This topic is important for us because we suppose that the social body is not a segregated phenomenon; on the contrary, it has a strong connection with some behavioural and cognitive aspects of social life [1].
In the research supporting our paper we followed the hypothesis that the social representation of the body takes effect in physical activity habits, sports and drug consumption. At least it is a phenomenon which is in strong connection with behaviour patterns like these. As the culture of the social body is a phenomenon of globalization processes, we suppose that no more do the national culture of everyday life, of modal way of life or way of thinking, local system of values and processes of socialization determine health culture generally, and drug consumption habits particularly.
First of all we have to mention that the last two phenomena are obviously discrepant, but our experience shows that they are in a quite specific and significant connection. According to several studies on the topic of the contemporary social character of sport, it may teach people how to win gracefully; but it may also teach them how to win at any cost, even if this involves violence, cheating or other deviant and maladaptive behavioural models. In order to understand the complex relationships between modern sport and other elements of society, it is necessary to strip away early preconceptions of how sport should operate, and we should instead examine the way in which sport actually operates. Examining that issue, sociology necessarily has to collaborate with psychology, medicine and sport science, which were previously much more active in research of this question than sociology was [2, 3, 4].
Sport has been changing recently (Fig. 1). Earlier it was known as the main protective factor against behaviour disorders including drug abuse [5]. As the result of changing processes, nowadays sport is not only losing its earlier role, but it has been becoming a quite strong predictive factor of drug consumption. What are the main dimensions of the disintegration of sport in relation with changing processes?
Fig. 1.
– Identity of sportsmen is changing,
– Changing of collective relations in sport,
– Chances for a sports career are becoming very different for people interested in professional sports,
– New relations are developing between sport and general consumption,
– Expansion of the sexual subculture into the field of sports,
– Disintegration of the school, and increasing effect of that on sports conditions,
– Disintegration of the family as the main supportive system and its effect on sport integrity.
Having done our past research we found out that due to the mentioned factors, sports activity can be correlated with drug consumption in several aspects. These are mainly [6]:
Correlation coefficients
– mental and relaxing disorders – 0.7
– disorders of youngster´s ethos – 0.4
– problems of contemporary communities – 0.8
– sexual subculture – 0.6
– disorders in value system – 0.8
– dissolving of autonomous sports values in civil values – 0.5
– transition of sport from the cultural living-word into the social system – 0.4
– emphasising the sociobiological aspects of the body – 0.9
– ambivalent social culture with drugs and drug consumption – 0.7
As we can see, emphasising the social body with drugs and drug consumption is the strongest relation between these phenomena. So we should discover how the social body and its representation predict drug consumption habits and as a partial factor how sport collaborates in that process. The human body in the 21st century has lost its exclusive biological and anatomical importance [7, 8, 9]. In parallel with that, the social meaning of the body has been becoming more and more important. The body is becoming the most meaningful representation and holder of social status; it is becoming the most important channel of mobility and the most often used platform of interpersonal contacts. That is why the human body is one of the significant subjects of young people´s activities. People, especially young people, permanently try to reconstruct their bodies according to the actual social and cultural challenges.
But the reconstruction of the body is often accompanied by dysfunctional patterns of behaviour, way of thinking and attitudes. Competition among young people for better positions in society typically leads them to abnormal, unhealthy or deviant behaviour. So efforts for the ideal body can be correlated with drug abuse. This connection can appear directly or indirectly. Young people are disposed to use drugs directly for reconstructing their own bodies. This is mainly the practice of sportsmen. People who are less interested in sports activities connect with drugs in another dimension: remodelling of their bodies cannot be realized only in a physical way, which in any case needs hard work, endurance and a systematic and ordered way of life. The body can be reformed virtually too. Many people who are unsatisfied with their own bodies, and lacking sufficient will to do something about it, settle for seeing their own bodies as an optimal phenomenon. Or they settle for suppressing negative emotions and opinions about themselves. In strategies like these, drugs can be useful and effective. This model of connection is to be the model of young people excluded from sport activities [10].
Concerning drug consumption, it has become the most general and most harmful behavioural form of youngsters. The drug user´s behaviour is a representation of an idiosyncratic worldview, which cannot find adequate forms of expression amid the options culturally endorsed by modern society. Thus, drug use is in effect a consequence of a unique interpretation of the world. Illicit drugs create a special filter between the environment and the drug user´s perception, resulting in an image of reality that might never be experienced under different circumstances [11, 12].
We set up a hypothesis: although the professional literature of addictology declares that background factors, the predictors of abuse, are not the most important questions in discussing drug problems, we suggest that by exploring the last ones we can understand the meaning and the character of illicit drug use more deeply, so we can prevent it more effectively. We assume that the social body – the way young people use their bodies, how they understand what social and cultural roles they attach to their bodies, what connection exists between their sex and gender and finally the way their bodies become an instrument for their social carrier – is an important factor causing drug consumption. In the connection of the social body and drug consumption we suppose a partial role for sports activity.
An empirical survey was carried out to explore these questions. 1129 young people between 17 and 18 were chosen in three countries, Poland, Ukraine and Hungary, as the sample of the research (Fig. 2) [13]. They represented the whole generation of this age according to sex and type of secondary schools. The young people were randomly chosen for the questionnaire. Whole classes were asked and after sampling the correct proportions were weighted. The data were analyzed by the SPSS 14.1 statistical program.
Fig. 2. Sample of the research by countries.
We approached the status of the social body through eating habits, eating disorders, and subjective health status and young people´s body image.
In our countries 17-18 year-old youngsters can characterize their own health status as just "healthy” and about 15% percent of them think that they are expressly unhealthy. If we examine that question by country, we can observe that unfortunately Polish students have the worst opinion about their health status (Fig. 3). We should stress that this is only subjective health status, not objective. On the other hand, if we accept the thesis of medical sociology and psychology according to which general and particularly health-related satisfaction with one´s own personality is a very important background factor of health status, the situation can be said to be not too favourable.
Fig. 3. Subjective health status by countries.
Concerning eating habits we examined how regularly youngsters have breakfast. Although the largest proportion of them do it every day, we can observe that most youngsters (more than half) do not eat every morning, and what is more, about 20% percent of them never do it. Differences among countries show that in this question the Hungarians are in the worst position (Fig. 4).
Fig. 4. Having breakfast during last 7 days.
We can say the same about physical activity habits (Fig. 5). Most young people hardly do any physical exercise, and in that respect the Hungarians are the laziest if we exclude those who are never involved in that kind of activity. The same is shown in the question about being satisfied with body weight too. The Hungarian students are the most unsatisfied, and the Ukrainian ones have the best body image.
Fig. 5. Physical activity during last 7 days.
Finally, let us observe the situation with legal and illicit drugs. We can find out that there are several significant differences between the drug-using habits of youngsters of different countries. Smoking and drinking habits cause the strongest problem in Hungary (Fig. 6 and 7). (We should mention that regarding the whole population, Hungary is the most infected among the three countries. Following the Jellinek formula, in Hungary every 7th adult is an alcoholic). Illicit drugs are most widespread in Ukraine (Fig. 8). But we have to consider that Ukrainian youngsters comprise a very heterogeneous sample. Not only frequent users but the abstinent also are overweight in that group.
Fig. 6. Smoking habits.
Fig. 7. Drinking alcohol.
Fig. 8. Using marihuana.
So, we have found that health-related background factors are quite different in the three countries. We can see different subjective health status, eating habits, body satisfaction and drug use behaviour, but in the results we did not find any linear and manifest connection between social body, sports activity and drug consumption in the three countries. This means that these phenomena are not direct causal factors each for other. At least these relations are not significant according to the statistical methods (paired sample t-test, ANOVA, chi-square). So in the first step these factors may seem to be independent. Although the different cultures give the young people quite different way of life patterns, their elements are not in linear connection.
The deeper analyses, however, showed that social body and sports activity indeed explain coefficients of drug consumption (stepwise regression). Moreover, we have been able to establish that there are several segregated groups of young people around these behaviour patterns. In sum, we found 9 groups of patterns (factor analysis) (Fig. 9): two in sports activity – a game-centred and a professional sport model; in the social body – the first group emphasizes the meaning of physical conditions, the second one has aesthetic aspects, the third puts stress on partnerships, and the last one on natural beauty; in drug consumption we noted three groups: users of illicit drugs, people with heavy drinking and smoking behaviour patterns, and youngsters abusing medicine.
Fig. 9. Component Plot in Rotated Space.
We found a significant correlation between some factors (Table 1). For professional sportsmen their bodies do not hold any importance, but they are involved in illegal drug and illegitimate medicine consumption. People doing physical activities for relaxation might be interested in aesthetic aspects of their bodies, and do not use any drugs.
Table 1. Correlation is significant at the 0.01 level (2 – tailed).
| | | FAC1_1 REGR factor score 1 for analysis 1 | FAC2_1 REGR factor score 2 for analysis 1 | FAC1_2 REGR factor score 1 for analysis 2 | FAC2_2 REGR factor score 2 for analysis 2 | FAC3_2 REGR factor score 3 for analysis 2 | FAC4_2 REGR factor score 4 for analysis 2 | FAC1_3 REGR factor score 1 for analysis 3 | FAC2_3 REGR factor score 2 for analysis 3 | FAC3_3 REGR factor score 3 for analysis 3 |
| FAC1_1 REGR factor score 1 for analysis 1 | Pearson Correlation | 1 | ,000 | ,547(**) | ,296 | -,321 | ,223 | ,066 | ,070 | ,077 |
| Sig. (2-tailed) | . | 1,000 | ,006 | ,160 | ,126 | ,296 | ,175 | ,145 | ,109 |
| N | 443 | 443 | 24 | 24 | 24 | 24 | 430 | 430 | 430 |
| FAC2_1 REGR factor score 2 for analysis 1 | Pearson Correlation | ,000 | 1 | ,071 | ,040 | -,201 | -,024 | ,099(*) | ,081 | ,140(**) |
| Sig. (2-tailed) | 1,000 | . | ,743 | ,853 | ,347 | ,911 | ,040 | ,095 | ,004 |
| N | 443 | 443 | 24 | 24 | 24 | 24 | 430 | 430 | 430 |
| FAC1_2 REGR factor score 1 for analysis 2 | Pearson Correlation | ,547(**) | ,071 | 1 | ,000 | ,000 | ,000 | ,197 | -,078 | ,235 |
| Sig. (2-tailed) | ,006 | ,743 | . | 1,000 | 1,000 | 1,000 | ,367 | ,722 | ,281 |
| N | 24 | 24 | 24 | 24 | 24 | 24 | 23 | 23 | 23 |
| FAC2_2 REGR factor score 2 for analysis 2 | Pearson Correlation | ,296 | ,040 | ,000 | 1 | ,000 | ,000 | -,035 | -,301 | ,622(**) |
| Sig. (2-tailed) | ,160 | ,853 | 1,000 | . | 1,000 | 1,000 | ,874 | ,163 | ,002 |
| N | 24 | 24 | 24 | 24 | 24 | 24 | 23 | 23 | 23 |
| FAC3_2 REGR factor score 3 for analysis 2 | Pearson Correlation | -,321 | -,201 | ,000 | ,000 | 1 | ,000 | ,509(*) | ,069 | ,086 |
| Sig. (2-tailed) | ,126 | ,347 | 1,000 | 1,000 | . | 1,000 | ,013 | ,756 | ,696 |
| N | 24 | 24 | 24 | 24 | 24 | 24 | 23 | 23 | 23 |
| FAC4_2 REGR factor score 4 for analysis 2 | Pearson Correlation | ,223 | -,024 | ,000 | ,000 | ,000 | 1 | ,079 | -,049 | ,404 |
| Sig. (2-tailed) | ,296 | ,911 | 1,000 | 1,000 | 1,000 | . | ,721 | ,824 | ,056 |
| N | 24 | 24 | 24 | 24 | 24 | 24 | 23 | 23 | 23 |
| FAC1_3 REGR factor score 1 for analysis 3 | Pearson Correlation | ,066 | ,099(*) | ,197 | -,035 | ,509(*) | ,079 | 1 | ,000 | ,000 |
| Sig. (2-tailed) | ,175 | ,040 | ,367 | ,874 | ,013 | ,721 | . | 1,000 | 1,000 |
| N | 430 | 430 | 23 | 23 | 23 | 23 | 430 | 430 | 430 |
| FAC2_3 REGR factor score 2 for analysis 3 | Pearson Correlation | ,070 | ,081 | -,078 | -,301 | ,069 | -,049 | ,000 | 1 | ,000 |
| Sig. (2-tailed) | ,145 | ,095 | ,722 | ,163 | ,756 | ,824 | 1,000 | . | 1,000 |
| N | 430 | 430 | 23 | 23 | 23 | 23 | 430 | 430 | 430 |
| FAC3_3 REGR factor score 3 for analysis 3 | Pearson Correlation | ,077 | ,140(**) | ,235 | ,622(**) | ,086 | ,404 | ,000 | ,000 | 1 |
| Sig. (2-tailed) | ,109 | ,004 | ,281 | ,002 | ,696 | ,056 | 1,000 | 1,000 | . |
| N | 430 | 430 | 23 | 23 | 23 | 23 | 430 | 430 | 430 |
People using their bodies in and for partner – connections do not play sports but they prefer illegal substances. Nor do youngsters preferring natural beauty of their bodies play sports, but are involved in the illegitimate consumption of medicine.
We can conclude that national-cultural specialities cause different behavioural patterns, but only at the level of activity frequencies [14]. Concerning the inherent relations of patterns, with the causal explanation and the structure of them, we can realize that instead of national circumstances, global cultural phenomena such as the social body culture can describe the motivation system of drug consumption. Anyway we can conclude that the social body representation, physical activity habits, and drug consumption comprise a coherent system of behaviour. These forms of behaviour define each other; their new element is that the social body as a product of postmodern society refines the ´traditional´ relation between sports and drugs. It enters the relation between sports and drug use, and becomes a catalyst between them. So the drug consumption of adolescents even if interested in sports becomes more detailed and ´well-established´.
Piśmiennictwo
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