comparing the level of dissociative experience in prisoners with and without opioid dependence disorder in shiraz and its relationship with other psychiatric disorders

objective: many psychodynamic oriented psychotherapists believe that people do not become addicted without a reason they use drugs to avoid painful feelings, thoughts and memories. the present study examines the relationship between the level of dissociation, substance dependence disorder and other psychiatric disorder. methods: in a descriptive study on prisoners of adel-abad prison, shiraz, iran, a sample of 4 groups of 29 women, and 30 men with opioid dependence, and 27 women and 30 men without dependence filled out the des ii questionnaire and scl-90-r. the groups were compared regarding mean of des with t-test and chi-square and also correlation coefficient for the relationship of des and other psychiatric disorders. results: women with opioid dependence showed the highest score in des ii (mean=48.9) among the groups and men without substance use disorder had the least mean score in des (24.27). the difference between addict and non-addict groups regarding des was significant. there was no meaningful relationship between des ii score and 9 aspects of scl-90-r. conclusion: the results are suggestive of a relationship between addiction and dissociation. it is supposed if substance use disorder can be explained as a “chemically induced dissociation”, or both “dissociation” and “substance induced disorder” might have common explanations in psychopathology.