ABSTRACT
Stressful life events have been implicated in the development of a variety of physical and psychological disturbances. Little attention, however, has been paid to the role of stressful life events in problem behaviours. This report presents findings from a study of the part that life events, among other variables, play in determining drinking behaviour in women. That is, the key to the significance of life events for a given individual lies not in the number of accumulated events, but rather in the cognitive saliency or appraisal of the event, on a number of dimensions. The argument states that for each type of life event, the higher the subjective appraisal of its significance, the greater its impact will be on the person. Having argued that any direct effects of life events on drinking behaviour are small, it remains to introduce an area of drinking behaviour which does appear to be 'sensitised' to stressful events.
