Spirituality, Religiousness, and Alcoholism Treatment Outcomes: A Comparison between Black and White Participants

Abstract

This study addresses an unexplained finding in the alcoholism treatment field: despite the health and socioeconomic disparities that exist between blacks and whites at intake, blacks and whites achieve equivalent treatment outcomes. Using Project MATCH data, this study explores religiousness and spirituality as strengths in the African American community that may account in part for equivalent outcomes. Using binary logistic regression, this study found that as purpose in life increased, blacks were more likely to achieve sobriety than whites. This study provides evidence that purpose in life is a cultural strength and an advantage among blacks in achieving sobriety.

“Spiritus contra Spiritum?”: Spiritual Well-Being and Depression Among Male Alcohol Dependents in Treatment

“…This has to be taken into considerationotherwise the (positive) effect of RC styles would be overrated. Moreover, by developing a Multidimensional Inventory of Religious/Spiritual Well-being (see Unterrainer et al, 2010) we were able to confirm that it does make sense to discuss religiosity/spirituality as multidimensional concepts, for example, by differentiating between general religiosity and connectedness or experiences of sense and meaning (see also Krentzman, Farkas, & Townsend, 2010).…”

“…Hope and forgiveness were found to be low in addiction patients in general, and therefore they might be gainfully addressed as an important topic by the clinician. Furthermore, purpose in life has been reported as a substantial positive therapy outcome predictor (also from a religious/spiritual perspective; Krentzman et al, 2010). Eventually, it may take interdisciplinary working/discussion groups to adequately address all the many facets of spirituality.…”

“…Otherwise, raising religious/spiritual topics in therapy might help the clinician to address these culture-specific peculiarities more adequately. However, this has to be done most thoroughly by first exploring the role of religiosity and spirituality in the patient´s biography (Eliason, Amodia, & Canoc, 2006;Krentzman et al, 2010).…”

Investigating the interlinkages of alcohol use and misuse, spirituality and culture – Insights from a systematic review

“…These studies depict individuals with different degrees of involvement with alcohol and at different stages. The studies go through a community sample (Drerup et al, 2011), individuals entering a detoxifi cation unit (Norrish & Jooste, 2001), alcohol dependents being treated in outpatient clinics (Krentzman et al, 2010;Robinson et al, 2007), and individuals who are abstinent for at least 10 years from alcohol use (Finfgeld, 1998). Drerup et al (2011) used data from a crosssectional study with an adult community sample (n ϭ 211), in which 65% reported drinking at least some alcohol in the past year, trying to replicate fi ndings from a study of a population of students.…”

“…In this study, measures of spiritual aspects are closer to the concept of spirituality. Krentzman et al (2010) used a clinical outpatient sample in a prospective multicentric quantitative study, to access follow-up data on 411 individuals. Information about drinking was collected at baseline and monthly for 15 months.…”