CORRELATES OF EARLY-ONSET AND LATE-ONSET ALCOHOL DEPENDENCE

The present study aimed at finding out demographic, clinical, personal ity, and behavioural correlates of age at onset of alcohol dependence. Fifty-one male patients of alcohol dependence (DSM-III-R, APA, 1987) attending the drug de-addiction clinic of a general teaching hospital in India comprised the sample. They were administered a composite soci o-demographic and alcohol use proforma, modified Sensation-Seeking Sca le (SSS), Multiphasic Personality Questionnaire (MPQ), and a checklist of behavioural tendencies when drinking. The early-onset alcoholics ( age at onset of alcohol dependence 25 years or less) were younger. The y had a larger proportion of first-degree relatives with both lifetime use and abuse/dependence of alcohol but not of other psychoactive sub stances. They had experienced a greater number of alcohol-related prob lems in the previous 1 year. They were also higher sensation seekers, higher on the Psychopathic deviate scale of MPQ, and tended to display aggression, violence, and general disinhibition when drinking. The la te-onset alcoholics (age at onset of alcohol dependence more than 25 y ears) were anxiety-prone and guilt-ridden, and had less alcohol-relate d problems. The two groups were comparable on duration, frequently, an d quantity of alcohol consumption. The findings are discussed in relat ion to some of the recently proposed typologies of alcoholism.