Divergent Links Between Specific Drugs and Criminal Behavior Uncovered in New Study

A paper in the *Journal of Psychopharmacology* analyzed ten years (2014-2023) of the National Survey on Drug Use and Health, covering 544,740 U.S. respondents. Multivariable logistic regression produced adjusted odds ratios linking substances to police arrests and self-reported crimes.

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Prior research has centered on alcohol and cannabis, leaving drugs such as phencyclidine (PCP) and gamma-hydroxybutyrate (GHB) under-studied. Associate professor of criminal justice Jesse J. Norris of the State University of New York at Fredonia designed the study to fill this gap.

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Recent PCP use was linked to tenfold higher odds of arrest for serious violent offenses and elevated odds for sex offenses. Female GHB users faced odds over one hundred times greater for a sex-offense arrest and higher odds for arson, robbery, burglary and fraud. Lifetime psilocybin use correlated with reduced odds of arrest for assault, robbery, theft and fraud, while tryptamine use (e.g., DMT, 5-MeO-DiPT “Foxy”) increased odds for arson and burglary. LSD and Salvia divinorum showed mixed patterns, and cannabis consistently showed higher odds of arrest and criminal behavior. Protective associations for psilocybin vanished among respondents under 18 and were absent for African-American participants.

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Norris said the findings provide an evidence base for how substances relate to criminal outcomes, but cautioned that statistical associations do not prove causation. He noted that residual socioeconomic confounding may remain despite adjustments for age, gender, income and education, and emphasized that PCP and GHB use are rare, so most violent crime occurs independently of these drugs.

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The study relies on survey data, which can suffer from recall bias and under-reporting. Small numbers of users for rare drugs may inflate odds ratios, and the cross-sectional design cannot determine whether drug use preceded criminal acts. Consequently, the analysis cannot confirm causality or rule out that the observed links reflect higher-risk individuals rather than drug effects.

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• “This study found that people who have used PCP in the last month have over 10 times the odds of having been arrested for a serious violence offense in the last year,” — Jesse J. Norris, Associate Professor of Criminal Justice

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• “I didn’t expect the associations between certain drugs and certain crimes to be so strong,” — Jesse J. Norris

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• “It’s important to point out that statistically-significant associations between a certain drug and a certain crime, and even large associations like a tenfold increase in odds, do not necessarily imply that the drug is causing the criminal behavior,” — Jesse J. Norris

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• “I’m working on one such project now involving a single psychedelic drug,” — Jesse J. Norris

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Norris announced a forthcoming project focusing on a single psychedelic compound to assess how timing and frequency of use influence criminal outcomes. The next phase will incorporate finer-grained variables to clarify whether observed associations reflect causal effects or underlying user characteristics.

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