Abstract
One of the most significant difficulties in dealing with alcoholism on any level is that so few people agree on what it is. In American society, there are differing and controversial perspectives current in the medical professions, the academic and scientific communities, and the population at large as to whether habitual and excessive consumers of alcohol are suffering from a disease, are victims of conflicting cultural norms, are weak-willed and irresponsible persons, or a combination of these possibilities. The stigmatizing aspects of alcoholism and the general paradigmatic differences among professionals have had far-reaching implications not only for prevention and treatment programs, but also for the affective behavior of the afflicted drinker and his or her family.
Preparation of this chapter was in part supported by a fellowship from the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism (5 T32 AA07240) through the Alcohol Research Group, School of Public Health, University of California, Berkeley and by a National Alcohol Research Center Grant (AA06282-02) from the NIAAA to the Prevention Research Center, Pacific Institute for Research and Evaluation, Berkeley.
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Ames, G.M. (1985). American Beliefs about Alcoholism. In: Bennett, L.A., Ames, G.M. (eds) The American Experience with Alcohol. Springer, Boston, MA. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4899-0530-7_3
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4899-0530-7_3
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