ABSTRACT
Both childhood violence and alcohol problems are widespread in the US. In a nationally representative sample of 6,002 families, Straus and Gelles (1990) found that 11 per cent of children (approximately 6.9 million) were annual victims of parental violence (defined as being hit with an object, kicked, bitten, punched, beat up, burned, scalded, or threatened or attacked with a knife or gun). From 20 to 30 per cent of adult women and from 10 to 15 per cent of adult men report having been sexually abused during childhood (Finkelhor 1979; Finkelhor et al. 1989). Williams et al. (1989) estimated that 4.6 million women met DSM-III diagnostic criteria, for alcohol abuse or dependence, and estimates of male-female ratios of clinically diagnosable alcohol disorders have ranged from 2:1 (Williams et al. 1989) to 8:1 (Robins et al. 1988). Zucker (1986) estimated an average lifetime diagnosis of alcohol abuse/dependence of 24.3 per cent for men and 4.4 per cent for women, averaged across three Epidemiologic Catchment Area (ECA) sites.
