TORONTO - Mention the words anabolic steroids and the first image to come to mind may be disgraced U.S. track and field star Marion Jones. But a new study suggests that it's not elite athletes who are the big users-abusers of the strength-boosting drugs - it's young males who just want to look good.
In fact, the U.S. study found that the typical user of steroids for non-medicinal purposes is a 30-year-old, well-educated male earning an above-average income in a white-collar job. Users report not only wanting a buff body, but also appear highly health-conscious.
Most did not use steroids during adolescence and were not motivated to start by the desire for better performance in sports, say the authors, whose study is published online Thursday in the Journal of the International Society of Sports Nutrition.
"The top three motivators that we seemed to see in this sample were to increase their muscle mass, to increase their strength and to increase their physical attractiveness," said Jack Darkes, associate director of the Alcohol and Substance Use Research Institute at the University of South Florida.
Other key reasons for taking anabolic-androgenic steroids (AAS), although less highly ranked, included boosting confidence, trimming body fat, bolstering mood and attracting sexual partners.
The study included almost 2,000 American males who took part in an online survey. (A small percentage of females also took part but were not included in this data.)
"We asked individuals what drugs they used, when they had begun using them, how often they used them, why they used them, different activities they were involved in as regards to sports, their income, family details and education," Darkes said Wednesday from Tampa, Fla.
"Basically, in a nutshell, we have a sample that suggests that the typical user is a fairly highly educated, gainfully employed Caucasian of about 30 years old, not motivated by sports for the most part."
Most respondents injected steroids into muscle - rather than taking oral preparations, which can damage the liver - and took other drugs in conjunction to mitigate side-effects from the muscle-building drugs.
"Steroid users in general are fairly well educated about the drugs they take, the potential side-effects of those drugs and actually fairly well educated in how to use other drugs to deal with those side-effects," said Darkes, a clinical psychologist.
"Most individuals who are using steroids are fairly health-conscious otherwise. It's a very interesting conundrum that they use steroids, but they also eat healthy and try to exercise."
Anabolic-androgenic steroids are similar to the male hormone testosterone and are used medicinally to treat youngsters slow to reach puberty, for some blood disorders and for some types of breast cancer, says the Alberta Alcohol and Drug Abuse Commission (AADAC).
Short-term side-effects include acne, high blood pressure and increased cholesterol levels. Users can also have sexual dysfunction. With high doses, a person can feel euphoria, aggressiveness and irritability - known as "roid rage" - as well as anxiety, insomnia, depression and paranoia.
Long-term use can lead to a number of nasty effects in men, including shrinking testicles, enlarged breast tissue and decreased sperm count. Blood clots, stroke, heart attacks, liver damage and cancer are also potential risks. Women can develop excess body hair, reduced breast size, deepened voices and other masculine features.
"AADAC opposes the abuse and non-medical use of performance-and appearance-enhancing drugs as inappropriate," said commission spokesman Korey Cherneski, quoting from the commission's policy statement. "Use of these drugs may have adverse health and social consequences, including serious potential for dependence."
"AADAC believes organizational collaboration is essential to develop a realistic and effective approach for dealing with the problems associated with misuse of these substances."
Darkes said that although selling steroids is illegal, most respondents reported obtaining their steroids via the Internet - and that's also where they get most of their information about adverse effects and how to combat them.
Steroids are taken in cycles, usually weekly for eight to 10 weeks. The user then stops for a period of time before starting the pattern again. In this study, most respondents took the drugs for two cycles a year.
Although banned by most professional and amateur sports governing bodies, many athletes take them to improve performance in activities requiring strength and power - sometimes at 10 to 200 times the medically prescribed dose.
Adolescents have also been known to try bulking up with steroids, sometimes with tragic results: there have been at least two cases in recent years of teens committing suicide after stopping steroids, which are known to act as antidepressants.
Darkes said the researchers hope their study will give additional information to public health officials who create policies on dealing with steroid use and abuse.
"It changes the picture of how we look at understanding steroid users and their motivations," he said. "They're not all the same. We can't paint them with the same broad brush. But this can be the beginning of research of trying to find out where are the problems that are going to happen for these people."
