Alcoholic women; personality traits during adolescence

There have been few attempts to study the relationship between adult drinking patterns and prealcoholic personality traits in women. The present study compares personality traits using adolescence of 30 alcoholic women with those of their nonalcoholic biological sisters. The picture of the prealcoholic adolescent which emerges is one of an insecure, withdrawn, moody, self-indulgent girl who is nonetheless basically competent. She lacks those traits (found in her nonalcoholic sister) which are considered culturally to be stereotypically "feminine." Adolescent personality traits which differentiate between alcoholics and their sisters in the present study merit attention in future studies.