That psychotropic drugs and other psychoactive drugs often have negative effects on behavior, is well-known to most. That their use can cause aggression, is known with antidepressants such as Prozac and Ritalin. However, there haven’t been any systematic examinations of these drugs and drug groups for their impact on violent behavior.

Now, U.S. scientists from the Institute for Safe Medication Practices published a study in the open access journal PLoS One based on data provided by the Federal Drug Administration (FDA), in which for 31 of a total of 484 studied drugs they found an unusually strong coincidence with reports of violence against others. This does not mean that these drugs directly cause violence, but there could be a connection.

31 drugs of a total of 464 drugs evaluated were associated with 79 percent of cases of violence during a period of 69 months. This included 11 antidepressants, 3 drugs for the treatment of Attention Deficit Disorder/Hyperactivity Syndrome (ADD / ADHD), 5 sedatives and varenicline which is used during smoking cessation. Its active ingredient is sold under the name Champix and has numerous side effects, including suicidal behavior and aggression – therefore, the FDA has recently issued a warning for this substance. The use of varenicline has to be consiedered as highly questionable after this study and is at the top of the list of problematic drugs. One-fifth of the reports of violence were associated with this drug, the tendency to violence is 18 times higher with it than for the other drugs. Bupropion (in Germany acted as Elontril) which is also used for smoking cessation, has a smaller connection to violent behavior, but is primarily used as an antidepressant.

However, there are links to violence with all antidepressants: all ahead is fluoxetine (Prozac) with more than ten times likeliness of violent outbreaks, paroxetine is in third place. With all antidepressants, the connection to violence is 8.4 times more likely than for all other psychoactive drugs. There is also a high probability for amphetamines as Atomexitin (Strattera) and methylphenidate (Ritalin), which are used to treat ADHD and a 9 – and 3.4-fold higher risk of having connection to violence. Of the psychoactive drugs, there is the sleeping drug triazolam (Halcion) with a 8.7-fold and zolpidem with an 6.7-fold increased risk. Among the non-psychoactive drugs was mefloquine (Lariam), which is used for prophylaxis and treatment of malaria, with a 9.5-fold risk.

(Links to research papers and tables: “Medikamente und Gewalt” (German language; in: telepolis 12.01.2011)