S. Glautier et Dc. Drummond, A CONDITIONING APPROACH TO THE ANALYSIS AND TREATMENT OF DRINKING PROBLEMS, British Medical Bulletin, 50(1), 1994, pp. 186-199
Drinking problems are a major public health concern and a significant
part of this concern arises because drinking habits are very difficult
to change once established; although many patients can detoxify succe
ssfully there is a high rate of relapse. This chapter describes the an
alysis and treatment of drinking problems using a behavioural approach
based on the concepts and methods of classical conditioning. Recent e
vidence shows that alcoholic patients show a variety of physiological
and subjective responses to the presentation of alcoholic drink cues a
nd these responses may play a part in the regulation of drinking behav
iour. The implication is that cue-exposure treatments ought to reduce
drinking. In cue-exposure, responses to drink cues are extinguished by
repeated presentation of the cue without allowing subsequent consumpt
ion of alcohol. The empirical evidence for the effectiveness of such t
reatments is described and the current status of the approach to the a
nalysis and treatment of drinking problems will be summarised.