The community reinforcement approach (CRA) to treating alcohol and other drug problems is designed to make changes in the client's daily environment, to reduce substance abuse, and to promote a healthier lifestyle. This is the first book to present research on the effectiveness of the CRA for a clinical readership. It includes the original study comparing CRA with traditional treatments of alcohol dependence, and summarizes other trials with alcohol, cocaine, and heroin users. The CRA program provides basic guidelines for clinicians, focusing on communication skills, problem solving and drink...

An individual's decision to use alcohol and the frequency, quantity, and situations of use are the result of a combination of biological and social factors. Drinking is not only a personal choice, but also a matter of custom and social behavior, and is influenced by access and economic factors including levels of disposable income and cost of alcoholic beverages. Until prevention efforts cease to focus narrowly on the individual and begin to adopt broader community perspectives on alcohol problems and strategies to reduce them, these efforts will fail. The author challenges the current...

An individual's decision to use alcohol and the frequency, quantity, and situations of use are the result of a combination of biological and social factors. Drinking is not only a personal choice, but also a matter of custom and social behavior, and is influenced by access and economic factors including levels of disposable income and cost of alcoholic beverages. Until prevention efforts cease to focus narrowly on the individual and begin to adopt broader community perspectives on alcohol problems and strategies to reduce them, these efforts will fail. The author challenges the current...

Project MATCH was a large-scale treatment evaluation study established by the U.S. National Institute on Alcohol Abuse to determine whether the treatment of alcoholism could be improved by matching different types of alcoholics with the most appropriate kinds of treatment. This book, edited by the two principal investigators, is the first comprehensive report of Project MATCH, the largest alcoholism treatment study ever conducted. It describes the rationale, methods, results and implications of the study, and presents new findings about how treatment works, for whom it is most effective, and...

The community reinforcement approach (CRA) to treating alcohol and other drug problems is designed to make changes in the client's daily environment, to reduce substance abuse, and to promote a healthier lifestyle. This is the first book to present research on the effectiveness of the CRA for a clinical readership. It includes the original study comparing CRA with traditional treatments of alcohol dependence, and summarizes other trials with alcohol, cocaine, and heroin users. The CRA program provides basic guidelines for clinicians, focusing on communication skills, problem solving and drink...

Cannabis dependence is controversial. What are the health and behavioral risks of becoming cannabis-dependent? What counseling approaches have been tested with adults and adolescents, and how effective are they? What are the arguments for legalization, regulation, or prohibition? Looking back and toward the future, what do we know and what do we need to learn? This state-of-the-science review sets out to answer all such questions, beginning with an historical examination and moving into diagnosis, classification, epidemiology, public health, policy, issues relating to regulation and...

Over the past 40 years the rate of illicit drug use worldwide has risen dramatically, and with it the number of deaths reported among drug-using populations. What are the clinical, ethical and psychopathological implications of these deaths? In this book, Shane Darke and his team provide the first full, synthetic review of the epidemiology, causes, prevalence, demography, and associated risk factors of illicit-drug-related mortality. In addition, they examine and evaluate interventions to reduce these deaths. The major causes of death among illicit drug users are overdose, disease, suicide...

Cannabis dependence is controversial. What are the health and behavioral risks of becoming cannabis-dependent? What counseling approaches have been tested with adults and adolescents, and how effective are they? What are the arguments for legalization, regulation, or prohibition? Looking back and toward the future, what do we know and what do we need to learn? This state-of-the-science review sets out to answer all such questions, beginning with an historical examination and moving into diagnosis, classification, epidemiology, public health, policy, issues relating to regulation and...

Project MATCH was a large-scale treatment evaluation study established by the U.S. National Institute on Alcohol Abuse to determine whether the treatment of alcoholism could be improved by matching different types of alcoholics with the most appropriate kinds of treatment. This book, edited by the two principal investigators, is the first comprehensive report of Project MATCH, the largest alcoholism treatment study ever conducted. It describes the rationale, methods, results and implications of the study, and presents new findings about how treatment works, for whom it is most effective, and...

Self-help organizations across the world have attracted millions of individuals seeking to address addiction problems with drugs or alcohol. This book provides an integrative, international review of research that focuses on how these organizations affect individual members and whether self-help groups and formal health care systems can work together to combat substance abuse. In addition, it offers practical strategies for individual clinicians and treatment systems on how to interact with self-help organizations.