ARE ADULT CHILDREN OF ALCOHOLICS UNIQUE - A STUDY OF OBJECT RELATIONSAND REALITY TESTING

This self-report questionnaire study revealed that adult children of a lcoholics (ACAs, n = 49) were significantly different from adult child ren from normal families (ACNs, n = 55) on five of nine Bell Object Re lations Reality Testing Inventory (BORRTI; Bell, 1988) scales and from adult children from dysfunctional families (ACDs, n = 48) on the Real ity Testing summary score. Both ACAs and ACDs were similar to each oth er and different from ACNs on Insecure Attachment and on two family ba ckground ratings-perceived quality of paternal and maternal caregiving . Discussion of these results plus separate exploratory regression ana lyses followed.