Faculty Articles
Alcoholics Treated by Individualized Behavior Therapy: One Year Treatment Outcome
Document Type
Article
Publication Title
Behaviour Research and Therapy
ISSN
0005-7967
Publication Date
11-1973
Abstract
One-year treatment outcome results are reported for 70 male alcoholics who, while hospitalized at Patton State Hospital, served as subjects in an experiment evaluating ‘Individualized Behavior Therapy (IBT)’ techniques. Initially, subjects had been assigned to a controlled drinking or non-drinking (abstinence) treatment goal, and then were randomly assigned to either an experimental group receiving IBT or a control group receiving conventional state hospital treatment. One year follow-up results demonstrated that IBT treated subjects had functioned significantly better than control subjects. Dependent variable measures included daily drinking disposition, general emotional adjustment, vocational satisfaction, occupational status, driving status and an index of residential status and stability. The results support the view that some ‘alcoholics’ can acquire and maintain controlled drinking behavior over at least a 1-yr follow-up interval. The difficulties of designing and applying sophisticated follow-up procedures and measures are discussed.
DOI
10.1016/0005-7967(73)90118-6
Volume
11
Issue
4
First Page
599
Last Page
618
NSUWorks Citation
Sobell, M. B.,
Sobell, L. C.
(1973). Alcoholics Treated by Individualized Behavior Therapy: One Year Treatment Outcome. Behaviour Research and Therapy, 11(4), 599-618.
Available at: https://nsuworks.nova.edu/cps_facarticles/23
Comments
This work was supported, in part, by Public Health Service Grants 1 RO1 MH 16547 and 1 R18 MH 23169. Portions of this paper, using preliminary data, were presented at the 80th Annual Meeting of the American Psychological Association in Honolulu, Hawaii in 1972. The authors express appreciation to Fred Samuels, Natalie Olsen, Robert Akamine and the numerous individuals and agencies who provided follow-up information.