The French and drugs: perceptions, opinions and attitudes 1988-1998

Monitoring the evolution of these perceptions and opinions provides useful information when evaluating implemented policies or campaigns that have been undertaken. Monitoring may also be helpful in the conception of well-adapted prevention messages. 

Approximately thirty different surveys, all related in some measure to drugs and drug addiction, were conducted in France between 1988 and 1998. Most of these surveys were commissioned by the Comité Français d'Education pour la Santé (French Centre for Health Education) (CFES) in preparation for prevention campaigns, or to measure their impact, or by various press groups interested in observing the state of opinions at a particular point in time. 

Considering the multiplicity of questions asked of the French in these different surveys, we find it appropriate to group them together into two major categories. First, how they perceive this phenomenon (types of representations of the different substances and users, level of feelings of proximity and tolerance), and second, their opinions on how to deal with this issue (information and prevention, repression, decriminalising use). 

Even though the elements produced by these surveys are sometimes contradictory and are often difficult to compare (different contexts, protocols, sampling methods and the fact that these problems evolve over time), they at least enable a large amount of information to be gathered.