NCJ Number
88113
Journal
Contemporary Drug Problems Volume: 10 Issue: 4 Dated: (Winter 1981) Pages: 447-461
Date Published
1983
Length
15 pages
Annotation
Research on marijuana decriminalization should be slow and measured and built around an inductive series of studies consisting of an exploratory study module, a pilot study module, and a major study module.
Abstract
The exploratory study module, which would cost about $100,000 to perform, would define the legislative process and its effects at the systemic, organizational, and personal levels. In this study, difference and similarities among State legislative processes would be examined through a demographic analysis of official data. An examination of factors influential in the legislative process would involve a legislative-history study of documents, a content analysis of media supplemented by interviews, and a legislator study using voting records, interviews, and a survey. Systemic effects would be determined through a cost-benefit analysis. An organizational analysis-time-motion priority study would examine perceived effects at an organizational level, and a study of knowledge, attitudes, and practices would use a mail survey of the general population. While the aforementioned study module would produce an understanding of the process of decriminalization and how and why it differs from State to State as well as some of its effects, using minimal resources, this research response is too limited. A pilot study module should focus on a broad effort to identify and define measurements of the effects of decriminalization, primarily at the personal and organizational levels. A major study module would then consist of a theoretically grounded longitudinal study of the effects of marijuana decriminalization at the individual, organizational, and systemic levels. Seventeen notes are provided.