The Experience and Acceptability of Drug Testing: Poll Trends

Abstract

With a growing interest in using drug testing as part of standard survey procedures for drug use prevalence estimation, we undertook an examination of national surveys of attitudes towards and experience with employment-related drug testing. After identifying 102 questions from 20 different surveys administered from the mid 1980s to the late 1990s, we found a trend suggesting that the population has become increasingly favorable toward drug testing. Although drug-testing policies are highly prevalent, personal experience with drug testing is not normative. Personal experience also varies with race, gender, age, and occupational group. Implications for epidemiological research incorporating testing are addressed.

Get full access to this article

View all access options for this article.

References

Bennett

Blum

T. C.

Roman

P. M.

1994 Employee attitudes toward drug testing: Effects of individual characteristics and employment setting. Employee Responsibilities and Rights Journal, 7, 117–128.

Fendrich

Johnson

Wislar

J. S.

Sudman

1999a The feasibility of hair testing in a household survey of drug abuse. In Mieczkowski

(Ed.), Drug testing technology: Assessment of field applications (pp. 235–253). Boca Raton, FL.: CRC Press.

Fendrich

Johnson

Wislar

J.S.

Sudman

Spiehler

1999b Validity of drug use reporting in a high risk community sample: A comparison of cocaine and heroin survey reports with hair tests. American Journal of Epidemiology, 149, 10, 955–962.

Hartwell

T. D.

Steele

P. D.

French

M. T.

Rodman

N. F.

1996 Prevalence of drug testing in the workplace. Monthly Labor Review, 119, 35–42.

Hoffman

J. P.

Larison

C. L.

1999 Worker drug use and workplace drug-testing programs: Results from the 1994 National Household Survey on Drug Abuse. Contemporary Drug Problems, 26, 331–354.

Klein

S.K.

Schittini

Levin

Susser

1997 Cocaine use during pregnancy: Sensitive detection by hair assay. American Journal of Public Health, 87, 3, 352–358.

Kravitz

D. A.

Brock

1997 Evaluations of drug-testing programs. Employee Responsibilities and Rights Journal, 10, 65–86.

Mieczkowski

, Editor 1999 Drug testing technology. Assessment of field applications. Boca Raton, Fl.: CRC Press.

Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration

1997 Worker drug use and workplace policies and programs: Results from the 1994 and 1997 National Household Survey on Drug Abuse. Chapter 5: Workplace Drug Testing Programs. Office of Applied Studies. http://www.samhsa.gov/oas/nhsda/a%2D11/WrkplcPlcy2-30.htm.

10.

Sudman

Bradburn

N.M.

Schwarz

1996 Thinking about answers. The application of cognitive processes to survey methodology. San Francisco: Jossey Bass.

11.

Tepper

B. J.

1994 Investigation of general and program-specific attitudes toward corporate drug-testing policies. Journal of Applied Psychology, 79, 392–401.

12.

Tepper

B. J.

Braun

C. K.

1995 Does the experience of organizational justice mitigate the invasion of privacy engendered by random drug testing? An empirical investigation. Basic and Applied Social Psychology, 16, 211–225.