Updated and expanded to reflect changes in recent years, this second edition covers virtually every aspect of this dangerous drug, including history, pharmacology, pathology, physiology, treatment, clinical and forensic psychology, and legal aspects. This edition features new chapters on criminal- and civil-forensic applications including an in-depth discussion of recent laws. Pointing out important cases, articles, and statistics, the text also presents chapters on neuropsychological testing; normative data on risk analysis and violence prediction; the physiology of tweaking, the most dangerous stage of the meth cycle; and the efficacy of treatment programs including examples from newly established drug courts.

America has a long history of drug panics in which countless social problems have been blamed on the devastating effects of some harmful substance. In the last forty years, such panics have often focused on synthetic or designer drugs, like methamphetamine, PCP, Ecstasy, methcathinone, and rave drugs like ketamine, and GHB. Fear of these substances has provided critical justification for the continuing "war on drugs." Synthetic Panics traces the history of these anti-drug movements, demonstrating that designer chemicals inspire so much fear not because they are uniquely dangerous, but because they bring into focus deeply rooted public concerns about social and cultural upheaval. Jenkins highlights the role of the mass media in spreading anti-drug hysteria and shows how proponents of the war on drugs use synthetic panics to scapegoat society's "others" and exacerbate racial, class, and intergenerational conflict.