Differential assessment and the treatment of alcoholism

The major objective of this study was to investigate the hypothesis that more effective alcoholism treatment would result from the provision of differential therapy, based on a differential assessment of psychopathology. A total of 135 alcoholics (125 male, 10 female), in-patients of a large psychiatric hospital in Co. Londonderry, Northern Ireland, were allocated to one of three psychopathological subgroups on the basis of their scores on the anxiety, depression and socialization factors of the Clinical Analysis Questionnaire (n = 45 in each group). Fifteen patients from each subgroup were assigned to one of two experimental treatment conditions or a control group. Experimental treatment Group 1 received therapy directed toward their psychopathology, while experimental treatment Group 2 received therapy directed toward their drinking behaviour per se. Therapeutic procedures were behavioural. The control group received only supportive counselling. The results at follow-up nine months later revealed that differences in improvement rates across groups were not statistically significant. A number of subsidiary hypotheses were also investigated and significant differences were found between the three psychopathological subgroups on factors relating to aetiology, course of alcoholism and prognosis.