New research reveals five types of excessive drinking and shows which type is more prevalent at certain ages.
According to new research, there are five types of
problematic drinking.
According to the National Institutes of Health (NIH),
approximately 16 million individuals
living in the United States have alcohol use disorder (AUD).
Experts describe AUD as a "chronic relapsing brain
disease" where a person drinks compulsively, often to the point of it
interfering with their daily life.
However, AUD is more complex than a person simply drinking
excessively.
According to the fifth edition of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual
of Mental Disorders (DSM–5), 11 criteria help a professional
decide if someone has an AUD. If the person meets two of these criteria during
a 12-month period, a doctor will consider they have the condition.
New research has
now added even more nuance to the issue of problematic drinking. There are five
types of excessive drinking within AUD, concludes the new study, which appears
in the journal Alcohol and
Alcoholism.
Furthermore, each distinct profile has its own set of
symptoms and tends to be more common at certain ages, the paper shows.
Ashley Linden-Carmichael led the new study. She is an
assistant research professor of biobehavioral health and faculty affiliate at
the Edna Bennett Pierce Prevention Research Center at Pennsylvania State
University in State College, PA.
5 age-related AUD profiles
revealed
Linden-Carmichael and her colleagues examined the data on
5,402 participants, aged between 18 and 64 years old, who were enrolled in the
National Epidemiologic Survey on Alcohol and Related Conditions and had met the
criteria for an AUD in the past year.
The researchers applied a new method called latent class
analysis to study subtypes or "profiles" of people with an AUD,
clustering together those who shared the same symptoms, as well as drinking too
much. The analysis revealed five AUD classes:
·
"Alcohol-induced injury" characterized 25 percent
of the participants. People with this profile engaged in risky behavior and got
into dangerous situations that might have caused injury.
·
"Highly problematic, low perceived life
interference" characterized 21 percent of the participants. This group
said that their alcohol consumption did not have any adverse effect on their
lives and did not affect their family, work, or social obligations, despite
also reporting that they experienced many AUD symptoms.
·
The "Adverse effects only" profile included 34
percent of the participants, who reported hangovers or
alcohol withdrawal symptoms.
·
"Difficulty cutting back" was a profile prevalent
among 13 percent of the participants. People in this category struggled or were
unable to cut back on their drinking.
·
"Highly problematic" was the final category, which
made up 7 percent of the total number of participants who had every symptom of
AUD.
Additionally, the analysis revealed how common each profile
was when people were at different ages.
"The adverse effects only and highly problematic, low
perceived life interference classes were particularly prevalent among younger
adults," write the authors, whereas "the difficulty cutting back and
alcohol-induced injury classes were more prevalent as age increased."
The main implication of the
findings, says the study's lead author, is that we need tailored treatments for
people with AUD.
"We need to think beyond whether someone has an alcohol
use disorder, yes or no, and take a look specifically at what they're
struggling with and whether they're in a particularly risky class," says
Linden-Carmichael.
"Additionally, while young adults are most at risk for
an alcohol use disorder, it's clear that it's also an issue for people in
middle age or in older adulthood, too. But it might look different, and they
may be struggling with different aspects of drinking."
"Therapists
could consider, for example, that when someone is a young adult, they should be
looking for that person experiencing withdrawal symptoms [...] Conversely, if
someone is older, they could look for struggles with cutting back their
drinking or alcohol-related injuries."
Ashley Linden-Carmichael
The lead author also shares some of her directions for
future research. "I'm interested in seeing, for example, if someone has a
certain profile at a younger age, what happens to them later?"
Linden-Carmichael says.
"If a person is in the adverse effects only class at
21, what does their drinking look like at age 60? Do they escalate or slow
down? If we could have a similarly large study but follow them across age, that
would be the most intuitive and most beneficial for practice," concludes
the researcher
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