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Abstinence Versus Controlled Drinking: A Critical Review

Abstinence used to be the only recommended goal for persons affected with alcohol misuse. In recent years there has been a trend to suggest controlled drinking for some alcohol abusers. The comparison of abstinence versus controlled drinking indicates that controlled drinking goals have proved to be successful in a limited attempt with problem drinkers having middle income, average intelligence, stable job and adequate social support system. Severely dependent alcoholics (gamma type) have been trained in some instances to control their drinking in a laboratory environment, but their control erodes over time. The controlled drinking controversy has partly to do with different theoretical perspectives on alcoholism, but part of it has to do with the issue of territoriality. What is needed at this point is an effective and thorough evaluation of a variety of alcohol-treatment programs with a variety of problem drinkers and alcoholics. In this endeavor a research design is proposed as an extension and improvement over the existing research methods on the comparative suitability of abstinence versus controlled drinking.

Identiferoai:union.ndltd.org:ucf.edu/oai:stars.library.ucf.edu:rtd-5732
Date01 January 1985
CreatorsPushkarna, Suresh.
PublisherSTARS
Source SetsUniversity of Central Florida
LanguageEnglish
Detected LanguageEnglish
Typetext
Formatapplication/pdf
SourceRetrospective Theses and Dissertations
RightsPublic Domain

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