Substance abusers: Role of personal and professional role traits in caregivers' causal attributions

Substance abuse continues to be a major health problem compounded by caregi vers' negative attitudes toward these patients. We investigated attribution s 55 primary care physicians and 315 senior medical students make toward su bstance abusers. Half of both groups expressed negative causal attributions , with women slightly less negative than men. Mental models based on LISREL regression coefficients showed that higher negative attributions by both p hysicians and students were related to their increased authoritarianism and depressed mood. Medical students choosing careers in primary care specialt ies, including psychiatry, expressed a less negative attributional style to ward substance abusers than those students entering nonprimary careers. Hea lth professional educators may find that using attribution theory to redefi ne successful outcomes in management of substance abuse can result in bette r attitudes for caregivers.