Future direction of addiction research-An expert questionnaire survey in Japan

Addiction has become a major worldwide medical, public health, and social problem. Because the prevalence of addiction varies widely geographically, due to differences in ethnicity, culture, education, social environment, and regulation, each country or region needs to understand its current state of addiction and to take appropriate measures, in multidisciplinary collaboration. In order to understand the direction of addiction research in Japan, we analyzed 50 research and development topics and their characteristics, based on an expert questionnaire survey. The topics were placed in five categories, as follows. Category 1: Basic science; all 10 topics were of the Long-term project and International cooperation types. Category 2: Translational and clinical research; 6 out of 10 topics were of the Long-term project. Category 3: Fact-finding surveys; 8 out of 10 topics were of the Japan-specific type. Category 4: Health system and service; 8 out of 10 topics were of the Japan-specific type and Short-term project. Category 5: Study on society, culture, environment, education, and regulation; 7 out of 10 topics were of the Short-term project (similar to Category 4). As far as we know, this is the first systematic questionnaire survey on the direction of addiction research. The results of this study might support developing a strategy for addiction research, not only in Japan, but also in other countries.