ABSTRACT
This selective review of family interaction research into alcoholism focuses on six trends that not only have characterized research done to date, but also point to questions that are likely to dominate the field for the next decade as well. These trends include: a focus on clinical course rather than on etiological issues; a growing interest in biopsychosocial models of alcoholism; an attempt to explicate typologies of alcoholism and alcoholic families; the application of risk versus resiliency models to alcoholism; the use of “goodness of fit” explanatory models in integrating genetic and family environmental data; and the use of family regulatory behaviors as markers of interactional behavior in family/alcoholism research.
These trends are illustrated via a review of the work of two research groups—Steinglass et al., at George Washington University, and Jacob et al., at University of Pittsburgh—and a discussion of likely trends for future research in this area.
