This book offers a contemporary perspective on the clinical, dynamic, socio-psychological, and adaptive characteristics of paranoid schizophrenia when it co-occurs with synthetic cannabinoid dependence, based on a large-scale study. It also outlines targeted treatment and rehabilitation programs designed to help patients reintegrate into socially accepted, recovery-focused communities.

The study found that the coexistence of these two disorders leads to significant clinical and dynamic changes in both conditions. These include a polymorphism of clinical symptoms during schizophrenia exacerbations, compounded by the addition of synthetic cannabinoid withdrawal syndrome. By the third year, the schizophrenic process often becomes continuously progressive, accompanied by a slow increase in negative psychopathological symptoms and a notable “distortion” of these symptoms.

For the first time, six clinical variants of synthetic cannabinoid withdrawal syndrome are described. The book demonstrates the dominance of destructive psychological defenses, unfavorable adaptation patterns, and specific types of compensatory adaptive mechanisms.

Masood Zangeneh, PhD in Psychology, is a Professor in the Faculty of Liberal Arts & Sciences and Innovative Learning at Humber Polytechnic. With over fifty peer reviewed publications—including numerous journal articles, textbooks, and volumes issued by Springer and CDS Press—Dr. Zangeneh’s research program centers on mental health, addiction, resilience, cross cultural studies, and Indigenous well being. He has founded and directed several major scholarly outlets: he established the International Journal of Mental Health and Addiction (serving as Editor in Chief from 2002 to 2020) and currently holds the position of Editor in Chief of the Journal of Ethnicity in Substance Abuse, in addition to serving as Book Series Editor for Springer’s Advances in Mental Health & Addiction.

Dr. Zangeneh has secured competitive research funding from prominent agencies, including the Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR), the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC), eCampusOntario, the Ontario Problem Gambling Research Centre, and international bodies such as the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA). Cross disciplinary collaboration constitutes a central pillar of his work, spanning psychology, education, ethics, and health services. He has supervised doctoral candidates at the University of South Africa, Victoria University (Australia), Sultan Qaboos University (Oman), and Al Zahra and Islamic Azad Universities (Iran), as well as master’s students in social work at the University of Toronto and York University, alongside numerous undergraduate theses (BSW/BSc).

His international scholarly engagement includes visiting professorships at the University of Derby (United Kingdom), a research advisorship at the University of Tsukuba (Japan), editorial board memberships in Russia and Iran, keynote addresses in Colombia, and grant reviewing for Hong Kong Baptist University.

Nikolay Aleksandrovich Bokhan is Academician of the Russian Academy of Sciences, Doctor of Medical Sciences, Professor, and Honored Scientist of the Russian Federation. He serves as Director of the Mental Health Research Institute at Tomsk National Research Medical Center and Head of the Department of Psychiatry, Psychotherapy, and Addictology at Siberian State Medical University.

A leading Russian scientist in clinical psychiatry and addictology, he has made major contributions to understanding clinical heterogeneity and psychiatric comorbidity of addictive conditions, ethnoterritorial patterns of substance use, and the pathogenesis of neurovisceral complications in alcoholism. He pioneered non drug treatments for alcoholism using millimeter wave radiation and adaptive neurofeedback.

Dr. Bokhan is Editor in Chief of the Siberian Herald of Psychiatry and Addiction Psychiatry (2013). He is Vice President of the Russian Society of Psychiatrists (2021), President of the International Association of Ethnopsychologists and Ethnopsychotherapists (2013), and an International Member of the American Psychological Association (2023) and the American Psychiatric Association (2024). He also belongs to the European Psychiatric Association and the World Psychiatric Association’s Transcultural Psychiatry Section.
Author of over 1,000 publications, his H index is 19 (WoS), 21 (Scopus), and 40 (RSCI). He has trained 14 doctors and 54 candidates of science, founding the Siberian School of Psychiatrists and Addictologists and leading his own scientific school on comorbidity of addictive conditions.

Georgy Selivanov, PhD in Medicine, is a full member of the Russian Society of Psychiatrists and a senior researcher in the Department of Addictive Disorders at the Mental Health Research Institute, Tomsk National Research Medical Center (Tomsk, Russia). He also serves as an associate professor in the Department of Psychology at the Almazov National Medical Research Center, and in the Department of Pedagogy and Psychology of Extreme Situations at Saint Petersburg University of the State Fire Service of EMERCOM of Russia (Saint Petersburg, Russia). In addition, he is a practicing psychiatrist, narcologist, psychotherapist, and psychologist at St. Nicholas Psychiatric Hospital (Saint Petersburg). His primary research interests focus on regional comorbidity between mental and substance use disorders across transcultural (religious) population groups in the Northwestern, Siberian, and Ural Federal Districts of Russia, as well as the development of psychopharmacological and non drug therapeutic and rehabilitation strategies for patients.