PREDICTION OF RESULTS FROM CORRESPONDENCE TREATMENT FOR CONTROLLED DRINKING

Identification of people who will benefit most from brief intervention s is an important research challenge in the study of addictive disorde rs. The current study investigated predictors of response to correspon dence interventions for alcohol abuse. We examined both subject retent ion and alcohol intake over a 12-month period. The primary focus was o n the predictive utility of self-efficacy, stages of change and alcoho l dependence. Self-efficacy performed relatively well in the study, pr edicting both retention and later consumption. When predicting 12-mont h consumption from pretest assessments or examining subject retention over the last 6 months, self-efficacy offered a significant contributi on to multivariate analyses. However, in some other predictions a sign ificant effect of self-efficacy was eliminated after the entry of othe r variables. Stages of change significantly predicted mid-way through treatment, but did nor provide an independent prediction of overall re tention or treatment response. Neither the degree of alcohol dependenc e nor level of alcohol problems figured in arty of the predictions. Ol der subjects stayed longer in the study, and those with lower intake a nd higher pretest self-efficacy had the lowest consumption at 12 month s. Results are compared with previous research an prediction of outcom es in addictive disorders.