Stanton Peele

Stanton Peele is a psychologist, attorney, psychotherapist and the author of books and articles on the subject of alcoholism, addiction and addiction treatment.

Following a BA in Political Science in 1967 at the University of Pennsylvania, Stanton Peele took a Ph.D in social psychology at the University of Michigan, going on to win Woodrow Wilson, U.S. Public Health, and Ford Foundation Fellowships. Stanton Peele is an Addiction Consultant and an international and national lecturer and has published over 13 books on the nature of addiction. He is a practising psychologist and a psychological consultant. Stanton Peele has been on the Editorial Board of Addiction Research since1994, becoming Associate Editor in 2002. He is a Member of S.M.A.R.T. Recovery International Advisory Council and sits on the Board of Directors of Moderation Management.

Stanton Peele has been investigating, thinking, and writing about addiction since 1969. His first bombshell book, Love and Addiction, appeared in 1975. Its experiential and environmental approach to addiction revolutionized thinking on the subject by indicating that addiction is not limited to narcotics, or to drugs at all, and that addiction is a pattern of behaviour and experience which is best understood by examining an individual’s relationship with his/her world.

Peele believes that non-moralistic policies, education, and treatment that recognize that people may sometimes use drugs or alcohol, but that engage people in productive activity and assist people to overcome difficulties in their lives, will succeed better – and certainly disrupt society and the lives of users less – than current policies and treatments. In Stanton’s approach, addiction can be understood only in experiential terms. No biological mechanisms create addiction, people are addicted when they pursue a sensation or activity relentlessly and sacrifice other life alternatives to this pursuit, and when they cannot face existence without this one involvement. We know people are addicted by their behaviour and experience: nothing else defines addiction.