Assessing needs of alcohol-related services: a social indicators approach

In an effort to assess alcoholism service needs, the social indicators technique was employed. Data on 15 relevant indicators were collected. A three-step analysis was performed. First, cluster/multiple discriminant analyses were conducted to obtain scores reflecting the clustering of cases. Second, factor analysis was employed to derive scores spanning the space covered by the 15 variables. Third, results of both strategies were combined to obtain an overall need index score for each area.