A controlled examination of two coping skills for daily alcohol use and PTSD symptom severity among dually diagnosed individuals.

Investigations of targeted coping skills could help guide initial treatment decisions for individuals with co-occurring posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and alcohol dependence (AD) who often endorse worse coping skills than those with AD but not PTSD. Although improvement in coping skills is associated with enhanced alcohol use outcomes, no study has evaluated the utility of teaching specific coping skills in the context of comorbid PTSD/AD. We compared the effects of teaching two coping skills (cognitive restructuring [CR] and experiential acceptance [EA]) or an attention control condition on drinking and PTSD symptoms among 78 men and women with comorbid PTSD/AD during a 5-week daily follow-up assessment.