Use And Potential Abuse Of Alcoholic Beverage example essay topic

SUBSTANCE ABUSE ON CAMPUS Outline: 1) Introduction 2) BASIC ISSUES AND MODELS... Alcohol Involvement over the Life Span: A Developmental Perspective on Etiology and Course. B... Neuropsychological Effects of Substance Abuse. C... The Disease Model of Addiction. D... Alternative Theories of Substance Abuse Implications for Understanding Substance Abuse and Dependence in College Students. 3) POLICIES, PROGRAMMING, AND PREVENTIONA...

Policy Development: An Essential Element in Addressing Campus Substance Abuse Issues. B... From Reactive to Proactive Prevention: Promoting Ecology of Health on Campus. C... Prohibition and Freshman Residence Halls: A Study of the Enforcement of University Alcohol Policy. 4) ASSESSMENT INTERVENTION, AND TREATMENT)... Assessing Alcohol Problems in Student Populations.

B)... Intervening with Substance Abusing College Students. C)... Treatment of Substance Abuse Problems. D)... The Role of Self-Help Groups in College Students' Recovery from Substance Abuse and Related Problems.

5) CONCLUSION 6) REFERENCES The abuse of alcohol and other drugs remains the number one public health problem for colleges and universities across the United States. Alcohol misuse poses a serious threat to the intellectual, psychological and physical development of traditional-age undergraduate college students. College students who engage in alcohol and other drug use have been shown to experience significantly higher rates of motor vehicle fatalities, unsafe sex, and emergency care visits, sexual assaults and poor academic performance. BASIC ISSUES AND MODELS The developmental perspective is concerned with understanding the growth, maturation, and decline of the individual organism, from conception, through birth, and through all stages of the life cycle. Alcohol is a substance that is used for pleasure, celebration, relief, and even sometimes for escape. A truly developmental approach to understanding these patterns of use would require us to make inferences about the discovery and early consumption of this ubiquitous substance, far back in prehistoric time.

Somewhere in that prehistory, humankind decided to put energy into figuring out how to manufacture ethanol, and we have been doing so ever since. Out of consideration of space, however, this researcher will skip what we know of earlier epochs and move instead too more recent history, first to the seventeenth century, then to the nineteenth and twentieth, paying particular attention to the disease theory of alcoholism. The evidence for a substantial degree of instability / of alcohol problems over the life course is now significant. Heavily based upon population rather than clinical samples, it ranges from studies of youth to studies of adults. In the area of substance abuse behavior neuro physiologists are interested in the antecedents of abuse (why do they drink so much? ), the patterns of abuse (how much do they consume over how much time? ), the cognitive consequences of abuse (what cognitive components have been affected? ), the emotional consequences of abuse (are they developing psychological problems related to abuse? ), the permanency of behavioral consequences (is the memory permanently damaged? ), and intervention strategies for both the abusive behavior and the potential consequences (how can we change their behavior and work around the deficits created by their abuse? ).

The view that alcoholism and other addictions are disease states is pervasive in the United States today. Though many people are ambivalent about the concept, upward of 90 percent of Americans agree that alcoholism is an illness (Caetano, 1987). The disease (or medical) model is the foundation for professional practice in most alcoholism and substance-abuse treatment centers and the personal recovery philosophy for a majority of counselors in the field (Sobell & Sobell, 1987). Furthermore, the model is strongly endorsed by the membership of Alcoholics Anonymous (AA), other related twelve step programs, and by the medical community.

These groups are largely responsible for the shift in public attitude from scorn and punishment to the expectation that the alcoholic or addict will be offered treatment. Without the advent of the disease model, there would likely be very little treatment of alcoholism or other dependencies today and recovery. Substance abuse and dependence is now one of the most frequently occurring adjustment disorders in adolescents, young adults, and the general population. In fact, substance use disorders are the most prevalent form of psychiatric disorder in the United States (Meyers et al., 1984). Although all age groups are affected by this pervasive difficulty, adolescents and young adults are particularly heavily affected. A substantial proportion of the adolescent population uses drugs or alcohol to the extent that their health, interpersonal relationships, or school performance is adversely affected (Johnston, O'Malley, & Bachman, 1985, cited in Bray & Kinsley, 1990).

POLICIES, PROGRAMMING, AND PREVENTIONA variety of ways are available to institutions of higher education to address issues related to the possession, use, and potential abuse of alcoholic beverage. Among these are educational programs, counseling interventions, and treatment programs. None of these approaches can have their desired effect without a carefully crafted institutional policy governing alcoholic beverages. The policy cannot be filed away in a dean's office. It must be enforced and visible'. Guidance for developing a policy that will govern the possession and use of alcoholic beverages (an alcohol policy) is available from the Council for the Advancement of Standards of Student Services / Development Programs (CAS) (1990).

CAS developed a series of standards regarding alcohol and other drug policies that include the following features: 1. Policies need to be consistent with the law. 2. Policies need to promote environments free from substance abuse.

3. Policies need to define to whom regulations apply. 4. Policies need to identify prohibited behaviors. 5. Policies need to establish protocols for involving law enforcement officers from agencies on and off campus.

6. Policies need to outline procedures referring individuals to sources of assistance. The proactive prevention model focuses on positive, healthy behaviors in the context of the larger campus social ecology. It is proactive because it seeks to eliminate or reduce pressures, attitudes, and beliefs, which lead to increased use and abuse, rather then merely reacting to the consequences of abuse or calling attention to them. Primary Prevention, the objective of primary prevention is to protect the individual in order to avoid problems prior to signs or symptoms of problems. It includes activities, programs, and practices that operates on a fundamentally non personal basis to alter the set of opportunities, risks, and expectations surrounding individuals.

Primary prevention interventions are usually directed at large groups and / or communities. Secondary Prevention, persons who are in the early stages of problem behavior associated with alcohol and other drugs, or who are at risk for such problems is the focus of secondary prevention activities. Secondary prevention attempts to avert the ensuing negative consequences of abuse by inducing individuals, through counseling, educational programs, or treatment, to give up or change their behavior. It is often referred to as early intervention.

Tertiary Prevention, persons who are in the early stages of problem behavior associated with alcohol and other drugs, or who are at risk for such problems are the focus of secondary prevention activities. Secondary prevention attempts to avert the ensuing negative consequences of abuse by inducing individuals, through counseling, educational programs, or treatment, to give up or change their behavior; it is often referred to as early intervention. Thousands of freshmen experience culture shock when they arrive on college campuses in the fall. They learn that moving into university housing may cost them their drinking rights.

The university says there will be no drinking in the residence halls and assigns the task of enforcing its alcohol policy to residence-hall staff. University policy, incoming freshmen, and residence-hall staff comprises the elements of an enforcement problem. In order to study how residents and residence-hall staff resolved conflicts over the definition of the drinking situation, I focused on three areas: the frequency of alcohol violations, RAs' reporting practices, and RDs' enforcement policies. The studies, covering the academic years of 1989-1990, 19901991 and 1991-1992, sought answers to the following four questions, How effective was alcohol policy? How did residents' compliance vary with RAs' reporting practices? How did residents' compliance vary with RDs's auctioning practices?

Did a stricter alcohol policy have the effect sanctions theory would predict? South, East, and West Halls are the three City University (CU) freshman residence halls in which these studies took place (names of all persons and places are fictitious). The three halls, practically identical in architecture and layout, housed men and women students on alternate wings: South and West had eight wings (five male), and east had twelve (eight male). Each floor has its own RA, who receives a small stipend -- room and board and the use of a telephone. In addition to they " re other duties, such as supervision, information, referral, programming, and counseling, RAs are required to report infractions of residence-hall rules. ASSESSMENT INTERVENTION, AND TREATMENT Recently, the U.S. Surgeon General estimated that college students spend $4.2 billion on alcoholic beverages annually and called for a reduction in alcohol use on college campuses (Office for Substance Abuse Prevention, 1991).

The continued heavy and frequent use of alcohol among college students in the United States has also become a primary subject of concern to college administrators The Carnegie Foundation reported Those presidents of U.S. colleges and universities identified substance abuse, specifically alcohol abuse, as the most pressing problem on campuses today (Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching, While identification, assessment, and treatment of college students with alcohol problems are significant concerns for all individuals involved in working with this population, most college personnel report feeling unclear about how best to intervene on a student's behalf. The metaphor of intervention as a tool may be helpful in training university staff to assist impaired students. The metaphor implies that one can learn to intervene, just as one learns to use other tools. Experience and training will improve the effectiveness of the tools used.

This allows for a greater sense of confidence and effectiveness on the part of the person conducting the intervention. There is also an implication of the importance of context in the tool's use-intervention does not occur in a vacuum. A rake is a wonderful tool for cleaning up leaves, but quite inadequate for digging a hole. Minnesota Model of treatment: Alcoholism and other drug addictions are diagnosable disorders or illnesses. o Abstinence needs to be the primary treatment goal. o Chemical dependency is treatable. o The chemically dependent person needs to be treated with the same dignity and respect as people with other illnesses. o The whole person must be treated (including body, mind, and spirit). o A rehabilitation model of treatment is more effective with chemically dependent individuals than a medical model. The most widely known self-help group for the treatment of addictions is Alcoholics Anonymous.

AA is a good example of a self-help group that meets the criteria discussed. In the late 1930's, the founders of AA devised a set of principles, known as the twelve steps, to help alcoholics achieve sobriety, 1. We admitted we were powerless over alcohol -- that our lives had become unmanageable. 2. Came to believe that a Power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity. 3.

Made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God, as we understood Him. 4. Made a searching and fearless moral inventory of us. 5. Admitted to God, to ourselves, and to another human being the exact nature of our wrongs. 6.

Were entirely ready to have God remove all these defects of character. 7. Humbly asked Him to remove our shortcomings. 8. Made a list of all persons we had harmed, and became willing to make amends to them all. 9.

Made direct amends to such people wherever possible, except when to do so would injure them or others. 10. Continued to take personal inventory and when we were wrong, promptly admitted it. 11. Sought through prayer and meditation to improve our conscious contact with God, as we understood Him, praying only for knowledge of His will for us and the power to carry that out. 12.

Having had a spiritual awakening as the result of these steps, we tried to carry this message to alcoholics and to practice these principles in all our affairs CONCLUSION We have described developments leading to a scientific understanding of alcohol and drug problems. The burgeoning empirical work in this area has been the foundation for alternative explanations, models, and developing theories of substance use and abuse. These alternative formulations are continuously evolving as ongoing scientific work is integrated into these models. Our case illustration highlighted the significantly different understandings of and responses to substance use problems by the traditional disease model and developing alternative theories. One clear advantage of the empirically driven alternative models is that they offer substantially greater flexibility in understanding and treating substance use problems. Initial evaluations of the effectiveness of treatment interventions that have emerged from these new models is encouraging.

Additional study of substance use disorders must now continue, so that further refinements in professionals' manner of dealing with these pervasive problems can be realized. It is hoped that the end result will be more effective treatment interventions for the many young adults who experience substance use problems.

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