The controversy surrounding the use of LSD as an adjunct to psychotherapy for alcoholics in Saskatchewan has not been explored by social or medical historians. From 1950 to 1967, Saskatchewan psychiatrists developed new treatments for chronic alcoholism by using LSD on themselves, on volunteers and finally on patients. Despite early success and praise, the use of LSD in psychotherapy was later condemned by the media, the general public, the medical profession and eventually the federal government and was discontinued after being banned in 1967. The reasons for the ban were far-reaching and diverse. LSD was exploited by the counter-culture for "kicks" and was later abandoned by pharmaceutical companies because of the negative reputation lay-professionals and the media had bestowed upon its therapeutic use. As it turned out, legitimate LSD research became too clouded in controversy to survive the 1960s as researchers failed to convince the masses that the drug did not pose a threat to the well-being of society. In many respects, the LSD controversy can be seen as more of a moral panic than a scientific debate. Nevertheless, the LSD controversy provides a unique and much needed look into the history of medicine from a social perspective, illustrating that social values often have more impact on medical research than empirical validity. As recent evidence suggests, the psychotherapeutic potential of LSD -- as developed by Saskatchewan psychiatrists -- has not been forgotten. Indeed, a renewal of interest in LSD research has surfaced in several U.S. states as American psychiatrists are discovering, once again, that LSD can be a valuable psychiatric research tool.

The primary objective of this study was the development and investigation of the psychometric properties of a measurement instrument based on the integrated model of behavior roles of offspring of alcoholic parents (Schneider, 1989,1995). The Behavior Role Scale was developed utilizing Crocker and Algina's (1986) 10 step instrument development process and deals directly with the concepts of the original models of behavior roles of offspring of alcoholic parents (Black, 1981; Booz-Allen & Hamilton, 1974; Deutsch, 1983; Kritzberg, 1985; Wegscheider, 1981). The first three steps of the instrument development were completed in an earlier investigation (Schneider, 1989). In this investigation, steps 4 - 8 were completed. The following activities were undertaken: step 4, the construction of an initial pool of items; step 5, the review and revision of the items with the assistance of a panel of experts; step 6, a preliminary tryout of the items in a pilot test; step 7, a field test of the instrument with a nonclinical sample of offspring of alcoholic parents and offspring of nonalcoholic parents; and, step 8, initial investigation of the psychometric properties of the behavior role scale. This investigation contributed the following findings. The field test yielded reliability estimates of .72 for the Caretaker, .67 for the Super Achiever, .86 for the Invisible One, .89 for the Jester, .78 for the Rebel, and an overall alpha of .88. Initial validity was indicated by the emergence of a five factor model as the most interpretable factor analysis solution. The performance of the Behavior Role Scale was also investigated using six validity issues identified in the literature. Offspring of alcoholic parents, offspring of nonalcoholic parents who had experienced a significant family disruption, and offspring of nonalcoholic parents who had not experienced a significant family disruption had significantly different scores with the Super Achiever, Invisible One, and Rebel roles. The three groups did not demonstrate significant differences with the Caretaker or Jester roles. Additional significant differences were discovered with the Jester and Rebel roles among offspring of alcoholic fathers when they were compared according to their fathers' pattern of drinking. The findings of this investigation add to the research evidence which suggests that refinements need to be made to improve the clinical and psycho-educational uses of the behavior roles of offspring of alcoholic parents. Recommendations for future research include submitting the Behavior Role Scale to construct validation studies in order to further refine its ability to measure behavior roles and to be of assistance to researchers seeking to unravel the complexities of life for more than 28 million offspring of alcoholic parents.

<p>This study explores the possible resilient factors which prevent young people who have been exposed to parental alcohol abuse from abusing alcohol themselves. Additionally, this study explores the coping mechanisms of young people living with a (n) alcohol abusing parent(s). This study uses a qualitative methodological design. The initial plan was purposive sampling. However it became evident that this type of sampling is not possible as no suitable candidates were found. One participant volunteered to participate in the study and suggested a few other suitable candidates. The candidates were contacted and invited to become part of the study. Individual interviews were conducted with the participants, using an interview guide and a voice recorder. The researcher ended up using snowball sampling as the candidates suggested other possible candidates. The findings suggest that the participants experienced an array of emotional, developmental and socio-economical difficulties. Feelings of shame, fear, anxiety and a deep sense of unhappiness about the situation was shared by all the participants. The family, friends and some teachers were instrumental in helping to find coping mechanisms during this challenging time of growing up with an alcohol abusing parent. Religion, academics, and positive role-modelling were contributing factors to their resilience in not using alcohol themselves even though they were exposed to alcohol-abusing parents.</p>

The dopamine transporter, the principle binding site for such drugs of abuse as cocaine and amphetamines, has a critical role in limiting dopamine availability. Several lines of evidence, including variation of DAT density in human alcoholics and in vervet monkeys with a preference for alcohol, have implicated this locus as a candidate gene, which might increase vulnerability to alcoholism. The objective of this study was to identify polymorphisms in the regulatory region of the dopamine transporter and determine whether there was an association between any of the alleles and alcoholism. Five polymorphisms were identified: three in humans and two in vervet monkey subjects. Mutation analysis of this locus may be a critical step in identifying alleles which increase susceptibility to alcohol abuse in humans and vervet monkeys.

The purpose of the study was to test for theoretic trends of guilt' shame (quadratic) and defensiveness (linear) across treatment for alcoholic patients. The study sample consisted of91 participants. These included adult males who were in either outpatient or inpatient treatment for alcoholism.All participants were administered a questionnaire comprised of guilt, shame, and defensiveness measures. The questionnaires also asked self rating questions as a measure of progress and had a therapist section for progress ratings. Three null hypotheses were tested using trend analysis. Two way analyses of variances were also used to examine progress variables.ResultsIt was hypothesized that guilt and shame would demonstrate quadratic relationships across treatment and that defensiveness would demonstrate a linear relationship. None of the trend 2analyses demonstrated the expected relationships. The post-hoc two-way analyses of differences in guilt, shame, and defensiveness as a function of both weeks-in-treatment and progress measures yielded few significant results.Conclusions The results of this study do not support some of the major premises concerning treatment of the alcoholic patient. Research needs include operationally defining treatment approaches and refining concepts and measures. / Department of Counseling Psychology and Guidance Services

Whereas many studies of adult children of alcoholics (COAs) have utilized clinical subjects, subjects in this study (n = 229) were relatively well functioning college students. The Children ofAlcoholics Screening Test (CAST; Jones, 1983) was utilized to define parental alcoholism.Results of a multivariate analysis of variance indicated that COAs were more likely to exhibit symptoms related to poor psychological adjustment than were their non-COA peers. No significant psychological differences in male and female COAs were found. COAs scored significantly higher than non-COAs (p.< .01) on the Alienation scale of the Psychological Screening Inventory (PSI; Lanyon, 1978), indicating the greater similarity of COAs to those with psychiatric problems. Social Nonconformity, as a measure of psychopathic behavior, was higher for COAs than for non-COAs (p. < .001). COAs from lower income families demonstrated higher scores on the Discomfort scale (p < .01), which measures symptoms. Those subjects who reported parental greater symptomatology and anxiety than those who reported no parental depression (p. ( .001). Although parental divorce rates were higher for COAs (32.4%) as compared to non-COAs (10.9%), no significant association with any of the psychological variables was found for parental divorce.In comparison to non-COAs, both male and female COAs evidenced greater problem alcohol use (p < .001) measured by the Michigan Alcoholism Screening Test (MAST; Selzer, 1971). As demonstrated by a MAST score of 7 or more, 88.8% of male COAs and 30.5% of female COAs indicated serious alcohol-related problems. Parental depression was also significantly related to problem alcohol use in subjects. It was found that the MacAndrew scale (MAC; MacAndrew, 1965) was of little utility for identifying subjects with problem alcohol use. / Department of Educational Psychology

This study is an examination of the relationships between alcoholics' and nonalcoholics' attributions and their emotions of anxiety and depression. The research design is an ex post facto/causal comparative analysis. Subjects were 150 white males. The treatment factor is separated into three levels: no treatment for alcoholism (50 nonalcoholics), two or three day treatment for alcoholism (50 alcoholics in detoxification units), and three to six months of treatment for alcoholism (50 alcoholics in a supportive living situation, halfway house, three-quarterway house). The Michigan Alcoholism Screening Test (MAST) was used to separate nonalcoholics from alcoholics. The variables measured for the three populations are: attributional style (as measured by the Attributional Style Questionnaire-revised for drinking practices) and emotional state (as measured by the Profile of Mood State).One-way MANOVA analysis was used to examine the data because there are three attributional areas measured by the ASQ (internality, stability, and globality) and two emotional areas measured by the POMS (tension-anxiety, depression-dejection). MANOVA analysis resulted in a significant F. The three groups were significantly different at the multivariate level in terms of attributional and emotional states.Discriminate analysis was used to determine if the groups were reliably different. Both synthetic variables analyzed resulted in significant results. The first synthetic variable was labeled "emotional stability," and the second was labeled "specific causal attribution."Univariate analysis showed: (1) no significant difference between groups on the internal/external dimension or the stable/unstable dimension, (2) significant difference at the .01 level on the global/specific dimension when comparing alcoholics in recovery and nonalcoholics, and (3) significant difference at the .01 level on anxiety and depression levels of each of the three group comparisons.Pearson Product Correlations were examined to understand the relationships between attributions and emotional states for alcoholics and nonalcoholics. The stable/unstable and global/specific dimensions are positively correlated with depression and the global/specific dimension is positively correlated with anxiety.All the hypotheses were supported:1. Alcoholics in detoxification make different attributions and have different mood states than alcoholics in recovery.2. Nonalcoholics make different attributions and have different mood states than alcoholics in treatment and in recovery.3. There are correlational relationships between the attributions and emotional states for alcoholics and nonalcoholics.Some alcoholic treatment recommendations were made. / Department of Counseling Psychology and Guidance Services

This thesis investigated the differential effects of the medical and social learning models of mental disorders on the beliefs, attitudes, and stigma associated with alcoholism and depression. The beliefs and attitudes of 345 college students were manipulated through the use of six different video taped presentations so as to represent those associated with the medical, social learning, or control models. Analysis off subjects' responses on a questionnaire indicated the medical model to foster the perception of greater severity, less control over behavior, less understanding of the disorder, and a greater need for intervention, compared to the social learning and control models. There was no advantage to the medical model in terms of the stigma associated with the disorders. An unexpected finding was that alcoholism was generally stigmatized to a lesser degree than depression, regardless of the model in which the disorders were presented. Results were discussed in terms of previous research.

The purpose of this correlational study was to determine if women alcoholics (n = 31) percieve their surroundings differently, and thereby make decisions differently, than men alcoholics (n = 29), women nonalcohoics (n = 30) and men nonalcoholics (n = 29).The Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (Form 6) was utilized to determine reported preferences on extraversion-introversion (EI), sensing-intuition (SN), thinking-feeling (TF) and judgment-perception (JP). A 2 x 2 factorial analysis was conducted to tests the research questionsthe .05 level of significance. Other statistical analyses included a multiple regression analysis and Cronbacks Alpha coefficient of reliability.Findings1. Female alcoholics do not demonstrate an extraversion-introversion attitudinal preference that is significantly different than male alcoholics, female nonalcoholics and male nonalcoholics.2. Female alcoholics do not perceive their surroundings significantly different as reported on the sensing-intuition index than male alcoholics, female nonalcoholics and male nonalcoholics.3. Female alcoholics report no significant difference on preference for the thinking-feeling modes of judging than male alcoholics, female nonalcoholics and male nonalcoholics.4. Female alcoholics report no significant difference on preference for judgment-perception modes than male alcoholics, female nonalcoholics and male nonalcoholics.5. The main effect of Alcoholic Status accounted for differences between groups on EI. Alcoholics reported a preference for extraversion.6. A two-way interaction of Gender and Alcoholic Status on SI indicated that male alcoholics preferred the sensing mode while the male nonalcoholics preferred the intuition mode.7. The main effect of Gender showed that the women preferred the feeling mode and the men reported a preference for thinking.8. Demographic information indicated that the women alcoholics identified specific precipitating events to their drinking more often than men alcoholics and that the time between the onset of drinking and treatment was less for the women than for the men. The women reported a more frequent occurence of alcoholism among family members than the men.ConclusionsWomen alcoholics did not report a preference on any of the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator indices of EI, SN, TF, and JP that was significantly different from men alcoholics, women nonalcoholics and men nonalcoholics. In addition, the MBTI was not validated as a reliable clinical instrument. Recommendations for further research are made.

There is no abstract available for this dissertation.