No abstract

Alcoholism is a chronic behavioural disorder manifested by repeated drinking of alcohol beverages, in excess of the dietary social use of community and to an extent that interferes, with drinker's health or is social or economic functions. The research design for the study descriptive research design. Convenience sampling technique was used to select samples. Structured interview was used to collect background variable, co-dependency scale and center for epidemiological studies depression scale. Data were collected by 100 from rural population at Kondancheery.The result shows that 17% were between the age group 20-25 years, 34%were between 26-30 years, 12% were between 31-35 years, 14% were between 36-40 years and 23% were between 41-45 years. 72% of the marriage were non-c0nsanguineous marriage and 28% were consanguineous marriage. Duration of staying together were 2-4 years for 11%, 5-7 years for 19%, 8-10 years for 12% and above 10 years for 58% of the sample. It was observed that among 100 samples.24% have only 1 child, 40% have 2 children, 30% have 3 children and only 6% of the sample have 4 children. 40% of the sample had no formal education, 29% had primary education, 25% had high school education and only 6% had studied PUC. The occupational status of the samples was found out that 45% were house wives, 47% were going for daily wages and 8% were self-employed. Co-dependency scale 55% of the sample was found to be moderately co-dependency scoring 16-39, 45% was found to be highly co-dependent. The result revealed that 80% of the sample had major depression after scoring ≥ 20 and 20% had mild to moderate depression. The mean of co-dependency was 38.33 and SD 6.7 and with regard to depression mean 32.58 and SD 9.1. The computes value of Karl Persson's correlation co-efficient was 0.2769. So, this shows there exists a positive correlation between co-dependency and depression. The Karl Person's correlation was used to test the hypothesis. Since the obtained r value is (0.2769) the research hypothesis is accepted. That is there was a significant co-relation between the level of co-dependency and depressive symptoms among wives of alcoholics.