Doping behaviour as an indicator of performance pressure

Patrick Laure

Sylvie Allouche

pp. 161-180

in: Simone Bateman, Sylvie Allouche, Jerome Goffette, Michela Marzano (eds), Inquiring into human enhancement, Basingstoke, Palgrave Macmillan, 2015

Abstract

The concept of doping behaviour was initially developed to better understand the way performance enhancing drugs are used, in elite sports and beyond, throughout society (Laure, 1997). If the ability to identify doping behaviour is certainly interesting in itself, especially when it is related to health or social problems, the hypothesis we advocate here is that such behaviour may itself constitute a useful indicator of performance pressure. We indeed believe that the very concept of doping behaviour and subsequent studies of it could prove highly useful to anyone whose aim is to devise better targeted public health policies and campaigns dealing with enhancing drugs, including in narrower contexts like occupational medicine. If a strong causal link can be demonstrated between performance pressure and doping behaviour, this could then lead to policies that focus on the causes rather than on the effects of doping behaviour, probably with greater effectiveness, and maybe also with more justice and compassion towards the consumers.