Analysis of alcohol abuse from sociological perspective
Annotated Bibliography
Kissin, B. (1983). The biology of alcoholism, Volume 6: The pathogenesis of alcoholism psychosocial factors. New York, NY: Plenum Press.
The book of Benjamin Kissin (1983) examines the natural history of alcoholism. The author defines the reasons and factor that cause or can lead to the alcoholism. There are various factors that can contribute to the contemporary social issue, such as “moral turpitude, willfulness, and role modeling, urbanization, environmental, stress, oral personality, genetic predisposition, and biochemical defects. The source will be very valuable since it makes the connection between the poverty and alcoholism. causes of the alcoholism are found in the past events.
Shaw, V. (2002). Substance use and abuse: Sociological perspectives. London: Praeger.
Victor Shaw (2002) work will be used to present the correlation of alcohol abuse and environment that can lead to it. The book is focusing on different perspectives that lead to the greater risk factor. He defines community, neighborhood and poverty as an import contributor the alcoholism. Already published literature in the book will get us overall better perception of the problem.
Galea, S., Nandi, A., and Vlahov, D. (2004). The social epidemiology of substance use. Epidemiologic Reviews, 26, 36-52.
Galea, Nandi and Vlahov (2004) presented ideas about the alcohol abuse, causes and consequence the abuse has. They come to the conclusion that with alcohol abuse the great social and economic damage has been conflicted. The work is important since it point out various researches already made in all stages frim initiation to use and misuse and to cessation, abstinence and relapse.
Cerda, et al. (2010). The Relationship Between Neighborhood Poverty and Alcohol Use: Estimation by Marginal Structural Models. Epidemiology, 21 (4), 482-489.
The book of Cereda et al. (2010) will be used because of the structural models with statistical analysis they examined rather than income and personal characteristics the work examines the relationship between alcohol consumption and disadvantage. They have argued that opportunity, privileges or disadvantages have a great impact on the pattern of alcohol usage. The correlation between the alcohol consumption and neighborhood poverty has been found. Therefore the disadvantage plays a significant role in pattern of alcohol abuse.
Hasin, S. Deborah, Keyes, M. Katherine. (2008). Socio-economic Status and Problem Alcohol Use: the Positive Relationship Between Income and the DSM-IV Alcohol Abuse Diagnosis. Addiction 103 (7), 1120-1130.
The work of Hasin and Keyes will be used since they summed the date from the face-to-face survey conducted in the year 2001 and 2002. The work examines the relationship between alcohol use and the socio-economic status. They have found the positive correlation between the income and alcohol dependence. Low socio-economic status is associated with psychiatric illness and alcohol dependence. It is one of the first work that examined both the alcohol dependence compared with alcohol abuse with the relation the socio-economic status.
Alcohol Facts and Statistics (2013). National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism. Retrieved from http://www.niaaa.nih.gov/alcohol-health/overview-alcohol-consumption/alcohol-facts-and-statistics
National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism (2013) will be used to present the social problem that alcohol abuse and alcoholism represents in the United States. Data from the institute will show the overall picture and statistics how many have been using, misusing the alcohol and how many cases were recorded of medical condition connected with the “drug”. The definition will be derived based on the data.
Boyle, Peter, Boffetta, Paolo, Lowenfels, B. Albert. (2013). Alcohol: Science, Policy and Public Health. United States: Oxford Press.
World Health Organization. (2006). Non-communicable Disease and Poverty. Geneva: Publication of the World Health Organization.
The World Health Organization (2006) has examined the connection between the poverty and various different “disease” among others also the alcohol abuse. They came to the conclusion that more poverty causes more alcohol consumption. They made analysis among developing and developed countries and found out that poverty is one of the leading factors which contribute to the alcohol consumption. They also showed that heavy drinking is contributing to the exacerbation of poverty.
Introduction
According to the report Alcohol Facts and Statistics (2013), “24.6 percent of people ages 18 or older reported that they engaged in beige drinking in the past month” while “6.8 percent reported that they engaged in heavy drinking in the past month.” Heavy and binge drinking are associated with alcohol abuse. These people could have used their potential, skills, and talents to contribute for the growth of the society; however, they are bonded by the addicting nature of alcohol. Alcohol abuse, characterized by unhealthy drinking habits, may affect one’s personal, social, and professional life, and if this continues, it may lead to alcoholism or physical dependence on alcohol.
The National institute on alcohol abuse and alcoholism (n.d.) defines moderate alcohol consumption based on gender. For men, moderate drinking means up to 2 drinks per day and 1 for women. Binge drinking is defined as blood alcohol concentration reaching level to 0.08 g/dL and usually occurs after 4 to 5 drinks. There are also various levels of risk for developing an alcohol use disorder. Low risk exists with drinking no more than 3 drinks every day and no more than seven drinks per week. The research has shown that among 100 people that had such drinking patterns only 2 have developed an alcohol use disorder, where alcohol disorder has been defined as a medical condition based on doctor’s evaluation when the patients drinking causes harm or distress (National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism, n.d.). Alcoholism has been defined as a mental illness. An alcoholic is a person with the medical diagnoses with chronic drinking of alcohol and has developed an alcohol disorder that can cause addiction and dependence.
Alcoholism and abuse of alcohol in the United State are a big social problem. 16.6 million adults in the United States in 2013 had an alcohol disorder. The problem is greater among men, as among women. The numbers for the youth are also concerned since estimation for the same year with the developed alcohol disorder was at 697.000. Around 90.000 deaths have been recorded annually in the country because of alcohol related causes. Alcohol assumption results in social and economic burden and loss of billions of dollars (National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism, n.d.).
There is no doubt that this problem can also put a strain on one’s financial health. On top of this, with the health care cost and productivity being impacted, the society as a whole is also affected. With this in mind, it is easy to relate alcohol abuse to poverty. The research questions of the paper follow: How do poverty and alcoholism relate to each other? Does alcohol abuse contribute to poverty or is poverty a significant risk factor too alcohol abuse? The paper will examine whether is alcoholism a product of societal poverty?
Literature Review
The work of Benjamin Kissin and Victor Shaw share few similarities regarding their view of the link between alcoholism and poverty. In his book The Biology of Alcoholism, Kissin explores the natural history of alcoholism. He cites several factors that lead to this issue, including “moral turpitude, willfulness, and role modeling” as well as “urbanization, environmental, stress, oral personality, genetic predisposition, and biochemical defects (Kissin, 1983). Furthermore, he identifies poverty as another cause of alcoholism (Kissin, 1983). Likewise, Victor Shaw also shares a similar idea. In his book Substance Use and Abuse, Shaw examines substance abuse from different perspectives. Using social control theory, he cites an ecological model based on the ideas of Urie Bronfenbrenner and Belsky and analyzes substance abuse from a certain level of influence called exosystem. According to Shaw (2002), exosystem “describes the neighborhood and community where the individual resides.” From the exosystem perspective, he cites poverty as a risk factor to substance abuse, such as alcohol abuse (Shaw, 2002).
On the other hand, the discussions of Kissin and Shaw also present a point of difference. In order to understand the causation and outcome of alcohol abuse, Kissin (1983) finds it necessary look at its history by reviewing different researches or published literature which “documents how excessive or problem drinking develops and progresses.” On the contrary, with the same aim as Kissin, Shaw reviews published literature from the perspectives of different sociological theories.
Aside from the two previously mentioned works, two more sources present varying ideas about alcohol abuse and its causation and implications. With a focus on social epidemiology, Galea, Nandi, and Vlahov (2004) believe that alcohol abuse results to “significant societal economic costs despite considerable efforts to minimize use.” This is the opposite from what Cerda and her group revealed in their study. Using estimates through marginal structural models, the group finds that “measures of neighborhood poverty are important predictors of alcohol consumption” (Galea, Nandi, & Vlahov, 2004).
World Health organization (2006) has with its research shown that there in fact can be found correlation between the poverty and alcohol consumption and further development of medical conditions. Together with the Boyle, Boffetta and Lowenfels (2013) the pattern of alcohol consumption, its use and abuse is greater among the poor which leads to further spending. The poverty is leading to the bigger alcohol consumption but also bigger alcohol consumption is leading to bigger poverty.
The pieces of academic literatures that aim to explore the sociological aspect of alcohol abuse has its share of strengths of weakness. For instance, in The Biology of Alcoholism, the historical data that were presented and analyzed came from other researches, such as Glatt, Trice and Wahl, and Park (Kissin, 1983). The strength of this study lies in the fact that it presents data about the development of alcoholism based on the findings involving alcoholics of different types. On the other hand, its weakness can be associated to the period of time in which the data were derived. Most studies presented in Kissin’s work were conducted during the 1950’s and 1970’s, which means that societal changes over the past decades were no longer taken into account. Moreover, Shaw’s work also has a weakness in the sense that it associates alcohol abuse with poverty from only one specific perspective: social control theory. However, it does not elaborate much or present supporting evidence that helps strengthen the said relationship. Meanwhile, the study of Galea, Nandi, and Vlahov (2004) shows its strength by analyzing data relating to alcohol use and abuse from different levels (individual-level social factors and family and social network-level factors, and community-level factors). This way, the social implication of alcohol abuse is better understood. However, the researchers acknowledge the fact that the role of socioeconomic status in the development of alcohol abuse is not yet fully determined due to “methodological difficulties of separating socioeconomic status from closely linked cofounders, such as race or ethnicity (Galea, Nandi, and Vlahov, 2004). Lastly, the work of Cerda et al., which aims to explore the relationship between alcohol abuse and poverty, also has its own strength in terms of the methodology used. By estimating marginal structural model based on data gathered from 1985 to 2006, exposure to neighborhood poverty and its link with alcohol abuse have been factored in without neglecting societal changes over time.
Sociological Theories
The relationship between alcohol abuse and poverty may be seen from different sociological paradigms. From a functionalism perspective, where it is assumed that interdependency occurs among different social groups, the problem of alcohol abuse can be considered as both a personal and societal issue. People in a poverty stricken area become susceptible to substance abuse due to the economic pressure while people who already suffer from this issue may negatively impact a society’s economy in return. From a conflict theory (focuses on inequalities of society) on the other hand, alcohol abuse may be viewed as a product of unregulated persuasion from prominent alcohol companies. Because they benefit from it and they give due taxes to the government, marketing isn’t as regulated as it must be, and those who are susceptible to substance abuse become trap psychologically and financially. Moreover, from a symbolic interaction perspective, a poor society may be seen as a product of people’s interaction – an alcohol abuser influencing another to develop the same habit will eventually pave the way for societal poverty. From these three, functionalism explains the link between alcohol abuse and poverty best because it shows that each individual in a society, when faced with alcohol issue, will definitely impact others in the community in one way or another.
Conclusion
The paper examines the alcohol use, abuse and misuse in the United States. The alcoholism and alcohol related issues are still severe social and economic issue in the country. The research questions of the paper were to resolve the connection between the poverty and alcoholism. The relation and correlation were shown with various different researches and statistical data available. The connection between the poverty and alcoholism exists. The issue was present in more cases among the lower income individuals as among the wealthier people. There are various risk factors connected to the alcoholism and one of the major is poverty. Both societal conditions affect each other. Not only that the alcohol use and alcoholism are more spread among the poor, but the alcohol consumption and alcoholism leads to further into poverty. The alcohol consumption and developed medical conditions should be prevented by lowering the consumption among the youth and adults, and to work on the reduction of poverty, which is a great contributor.
References
Alcohol Facts and Statistics (2013). National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism. Retrieved from http://www.niaaa.nih.gov/alcohol-health/overview-alcohol-consumption/alcohol-facts-and-statistics
Boyle, Peter, Boffetta, Paolo, Lowenfels, B. Albert. (2013). Alcohol: Science, Policy and Public Health. United States: Oxford Press.
Cerda, et al. (2010). The Relationship Between Neighborhood Poverty and Alcohol Use: Estimation by Marginal Structural Models. Epidemiology, 21 (4), 482-489.
Galea, S., Nandi, A., and Vlahov, D. (2004). The social epidemiology of substance use. Epidemiologic Reviews, 26, 36-52.
Hasin, S. Deborah, Keyes, M. Katherine. (2008). Socio-economic Status and Problem Alcohol Use: the Positive Relationship Between Income and the DSM-IV Alcohol Abuse Diagnosis. Addiction 103 (7), 1120-1130.
Kissin, B. (1983). The biology of alcoholism, Volume 6: The pathogenesis of alcoholism psychosocial factors. New York, NY: Plenum Press.
National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism. (n.d.). Definitions and Statistics. Retrieved http://www.niaaa.nih.gov/alcohol-health/overview-alcohol-consumption/moderate-binge-drinking
Shaw, V. (2002). Substance use and abuse: Sociological perspectives. London: Praeger.
World Health Organization. (2006). Non-communicable Disease and Poverty. Geneva: Publication of the World Health Organization.
