Alcohol use and workplace aggression: an examination of perpetration and victimization.

PURPOSE: The purpose of the present investigation was to examine the relationship between victimization from and perpetration of workplace aggression between coworkers and frequency of alcohol use during the last year. METHODS: Civilian employees (N = 300) selected from the US population were interviewed over the telephone with psychometrically sound measures of workplace aggression and alcohol use frequency during the last year. Hierarchical regression analyses were used to examine the relationship between alcohol use and workplace aggression, after controlling for sociodemographic variables. RESULTS: Both percentage of days of any drinking and percentage of days of heavy drinking during the last year were positively related to (a) victimization from verbal and physical aggression at work and (b) perpetration of verbal and physical aggression at work. IMPLICATIONS: Consistent with research studies spanning the sociobehavioral literature, the present investigation found alcohol use was associated with perpetration of and victimization from verbal and physical workplace aggression. Although the study established an association exists between alcohol use and workplace aggression, future investigations should attempt to understand employee alcohol use in the context of a multifaceted model that includes other likely factors that contribute to the incidence of aggressive behavior on the job.

Behavioral couples therapy versus individual-based treatment for male substance-abusing patients. An evaluation of significant individual change and comparison of improvement rates.

Fals-Stewart, Birchler, and O'Farrell (1996) found that married or cohabiting substance-abusing men (n = 40) who participated in behavioral couples therapy (BCT) in addition to individual-based treatment (IBT) for substance abuse had fewer days of substance use and, along with their partners, reported higher levels of dyadic adjustment during and 1-year after treatment than husbands who received IBT only (n = 40). In the present study, significant individual change in posttreatment frequency of substance use and dyadic adjustment was evaluated and comparisons of the proportions of participants receiving IBT and BCT who were improved, unchanged, or deteriorated in these domains of functioning were made using data from Fals-Stewart et al. (1996). Growth curve analysis revealed that a larger proportion of husbands in the BCT condition showed significant reductions in substance use (n = 33, 83%) than husbands who received IBT (n = 24, 60%). Also, a larger proportion of couples who participated in BCT showed improvements in dyadic adjustment (n = 24, 60%) than couples whose husbands received IBT only (n = 14, 35%).

The timeline followback reports of psychoactive substance use by drug-abusing patients: psychometric properties.

The Timeline Followback (TLFB; L. C. Sobell & M. B. Sobell, 1996) interview, which uses a calendar method developed to evaluate daily patterns and frequency of drinking behavior over a specified time period, has well-established reliability and validity for assessing alcohol consumption. Although several investigators have used the TLFB to evaluate drug-using behavior, few studies have examined the psychometric properties of the interview for this purpose. The authors conducted TLFB interviews with a sample of adult drug-abusing patients seeking treatment for substance abuse (n = 113) at baseline, posttreatment, and quarterly thereafter for 12 months. It was found that the patients' reports about their drug consumption using this method generally had high (a) retest reliability, (b) convergent and discriminant validity with other measures, (c) agreement with collateral informants' reports of patients' substance use, and (d) agreement with results from patients' urine assays.