A Comparison of the Outcome of Treatment in Female and Male Alcoholics

The literature on female alcoholism is relatively scanty. The few reports that have been published suggest that the female alcoholic is different from the male alcoholic: for example, Lysansky (1957) stated that American female alcoholics start to drink later, lose control later, drink alone, prefer wine and have fewer arrests or admissions. Perhaps her illness is also more severe: Fort and Porterfield (1961) discovered in their sample that the women required a much shorter length of time to become alcoholic than did the men; the phases of the process were less distinct and nearly all the women had serious personality difficulties or had experienced strong emotional stress. Another American author, Rosenbaum (1958), thought that female alcoholism was an expression of personality misdevelopment, and produced some evidence to support this view. However, he also demonstrated that in married female alcoholics the husband's own heavy drinking, as well as his non-constructive attitude towards his wife's drinking, contributed to the wife's illness.