Unique Aspects of Female-primary Alcoholic Relationships.

Objective: This descriptive paper assesses the applicability of knowledge about alcoholic relationships to treatment-seeking alcoholic women.

Methods: One hundred and nine heterosexual couples were recruited between 1997 and 2000 for a randomized clinical trial of treatments for female alcoholics. Measures included the Structured Clinical Interview for Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders IV, Timeline Followback Interview, Areas of Change Questionnaire, Dyadic Adjustment Scale-Revised, Spouse Behavior Questionnaire, and Drinking Patterns Questionnaire.

The protective effects of ethnic identity for alcohol and marijuana use among Black young adults.

This study examined the extent to which individual differences in alcohol and marijuana use among 167 Black university students could be accounted for by degree of ethnic identity. After controlling for year in school, sex, and friends' substance use, higher levels of ethnic identity indeed were found to be significantly related to lower beer/hard liquor use, wine use, and marijuana use, accounting for approximately 31%, 6%, and 4% of the variance, respectively. For marijuana use, however, friends' substance use accounted for more of the variance (13%) than did ethnic identity (4%).

Evaluating two brief substance-use interventions for mandated college students.

Objective: This study evaluated two brief personal feedback substance-use interventions for students mandated to the Rutgers University Alcohol and Other Drug Assistance Program for Students (ADAPS): (1) a brief motivational interview (BMI) intervention and (2) a written feedback-only (WF) intervention. A key question addressed by this study was whether there is a need for face-to-face feedback in the context of motivational interviewing to affect changes in substance-use behaviors or whether a written personal feedback profile is enough of an intervention to motivate students to change their substance use.

Method: The sample consisted of 222 students who were mandated to ADAPS, were eligible for the study, and completed the 3-month follow-up assessment.