Identifying developmental paradigms leading to alcoholism.

The lives of men who had been part of a delinquency prevention program between 1939 and 1945 provide information to identify developmental paths that seem to have led to alcoholism by the time of follow-up three decades later. Alcoholic fathers and their families differed from nonalcoholic fathers and their families in many ways. The analyses suggested that different paradigms describe the pathways to alcoholism for those whose fathers were and those whose fathers were not alcoholics. A mother's high esteem for her alcoholic husband increased risk for alcoholism of the son; among sons whose fathers were not alcoholic, increased risk for alcoholism of the son seemed to be a function of little control during early adolescence.