PROJECT TITLE:
Healing of the Spirit/American Indian Pathways to Abstinence
FUNDING SOURCE:
NIAAA
DATES OF FUNDING:
1999-2003
PRINCIPAL INVESTIGATOR(S):
Paul Spicer, PhD.
CENTER STAFF INVOLVED:
Marjorie Bezdek, Calvin Croy, Marvine Douville, Ann Wilson Frederick, Robert Moran, Nohoon Kwak, Paul Spicer, and Sheila Young
SPECIFIC AIMS/RESEARCH GOALS:
This study has 4 Specific Aims:
- to investigate how abstinence is meaningfully construed and experienced by American Indian men and women;
- to determine the factors that are relevant to understanding how alcohol-dependent men and women give up drinking and maintain their abstinence;
- to establish a typology of pathways to abstinence in this community; and
- to link characteristics of American Indian individuals with their pathways to abstinence.
RESEARCH DESIGN:
Open-ended ethnographic interviews with all participants in a previous study (AI-SUPERPFP) who met DSM-IIIR criteria for lifetime alcohol dependence. These interviews focus on positive and negative experiences that may be associated with remission, family environment, and coping.
PARTICIPANTS:
180 enrolled members of a Northern Plains tribe who met DSM-IIIR criteria for lifetime alcohol dependence in the AI-SUPERPFP diagnostic interview.
MEASURES:
Embedded within an open-ended interview focusing on the respondent’s story are probes for the following:
- Negative events related to drinking
- Positive life changes associated with remission
- Factors in the maintenance of abstinence
- Family dynamics, and
- Coping strategies
These are being coded for subsequent qualitative data analysis.
PUBLICATIONS:
None at this time.