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The Adult Adjustment of Offspring of Parents with Drinking Problems

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 January 2018

Richard Velleman  and
Jim Orford
Richard Velleman
Affiliation:
School of Social Sciences, University of Bath, Claverton Down, Bath BA2 7AY, and District Clinical Psychology Services, Bath Health Authority, 25 Midford Road, Bath BA2 5RW
Jim Orford
Affiliation:
Department of Psychology, University of Exeter, Exeter EX4 4QG, and Department of Clinical and Community Psychology, Exeter Health Authority, Church Lane, Heavitree, Exeter EX2 5SH
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Abstract

One hundred and sixty-four 16–35-year-old offspring of parents with drinking problems, recruited from a variety of clinical and community sources, were compared with 80 respondents of similar ages from similar sources who did not have parents with drinking problems. Each was interviewed using a semistructured interview. Adult adjustment was similar in the two groups, but the offspring of parents with drinking problems did report considerably more disharmony in their families of origin, and many more childhood difficulties. Factor analysis of the adult adjustment data for the samples combined showed four factors which accounted for 41% of the variance; these factors differed little in their effect in the two groups. The groups' reports of the drinking problems of their siblings, however, suggests that this sample might be unrepresentative of the true risk to the children of parents with drinking problems for the development of alcohol-related (although not other) difficulties in adulthood: 16% of this group reported a sibling with a drink problem and a further 9% were unsure, but only one member of the comparison group reported a sibling with a drink problem, and one was unsure. Path analysis showed that both parental problem drinking and family disharmony are related in complex ways to adjustment difficulties in adulthood. ‘Demoralisation’, the largest of the four factors, was particularly related to disharmony in the family of origin: in the absence of disharmony, offspring versus comparison status was negatively correlated to demoralisation in adulthood, suggesting that having a parent with a drinking problem might sometimes be a strengthening experience.

Type
Research Article
Information
The British Journal of Psychiatry , Volume 162 , Issue 4 , April 1993 , pp. 503 - 516
Copyright
Copyright © Royal College of Psychiatrists, 1993 

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