Abstract
The population of female drug users has been growing in China, and these women have been found to care deeply about their weight. Against this backdrop, this study examines the relationship between Chinese women’s illicit drug use and their intentions to lose weight, keep fit, and maintain a slim body shape. The participants of this study were 29 women who all had experience with illicit drug use for weight control. These women were drawn from a female compulsory drug treatment center located in eastern China. Semi-structured interviews with these 29 participants were conducted between 2013 and 2016. Expectations of losing weight and pursuing their ideal slim body shape were found to be an important reason for the study participants’ initiation of drug use, its maintenance, and failures to achieve abstinence. These Chinese female drug users were generally satisfied with weight loss outcomes subsequent to drug consumption. A fuller appreciation of Chinese women’s weight-loss-related illicit drug use patterns is much needed to help devise strategies and policies to deal with this growing problem. These include changing the dominant aesthetic cultural preference for thinness, paying particular attention to the functional use of illicit drugs in drug treatment programs, and having special interventions for women who interact with drug users within their social networks.
Highlights
To the best of our knowledge, there are hardly any studies of Chinese female drug users’ perspectives on illicit drugs as a means of weight control. To help fill this void, this study aims to explore the relationship between Chinese women’s use of illicit drugs and their thoughts on weight loss, keeping fit, and maintaining a slim body shape
The results below present the experiences of weight loss among Chinese female drug users according to three key themes
Based on a selected sample of recovering female drug users in China, the findings of this exploratory study revealed a link between drug use practices and weight control expectations
Summary
People’s perceptions of an ideal body weight and shape are influenced by social and cultural factors, such as gender differences, health concerns, and religion, and, differ across cultures and have differed over time [1–4]. Certain developing countries value full body figures, since these represent wealth, abundance, and fertility [5]. This perception was common in North America and some European countries prior to 1900 for the same reason [6]. Today, in developed countries where food availability is plentiful and good health is valued, larger body sizes are no longer considered desirable; instead, thinness has become fashionable [1]. Globalization has encouraged this aesthetic standard to spread to developing countries hand in hand with urbanization, modernization, and westernization [7].
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