Female and male life stories published in the Finnish Alcoholics Anonymous journal

To study differences in how women and men describe their drinking problems, key expressions were recorded in 50 female and 50 male stories published in the Finnish A.A. (Alcoholics Anonymous) journal. Men show more interest in the past and try to understand their lives in causal terms. Women focus on the present and on experiences in A.A. Men more frequently mention narcotics and alcohol substitutes; medical drugs are more common in female stories. Men's stories more frequently contain social deviance. Women pay more attention to social relationships. The phrase Higher Power is used with equal frequency, but women more commonly use the word God. Women express more positive emotions. Registers of negative emotions differ. The drinking man is threatened by feelings of inferiority; the drinking woman by shame and guilt.