Association between substance use disorders and self‐ and other‐directed aggression: An integrated model approach

Abstract

Our study's objective is to determine whether substanceuse disorders' association with aggression differs according to the type of substance and/or the form of aggression, within the same population. We used data from the National Survey on Drug Use and Health across 2008-2014, with a pooled sample of 270,227 adult respondents. We used regression models to estimate the odds ratios for those having alcohol and/or druguse disorder(s) perpetrating (a) each form of aggression compared with no aggression and (b) other-directed compared with self-directed aggression. Alcoholuse disorder alone and druguse disorder(s) alone were both associated with significantly increased odds of committing self-directed, other-directed, and combined aggression. Individuals with druguse disorder(s) alone were more likely to commit other-directed than self-directed aggression (adjusted odds ratio = 1.46, 95% CI = 1.04-2.05). Individuals with alcoholuse disorder alone were not likely to commit one over the other (adjusted odds ratio = 1.20, 95% CI = 0.90-1.61). In conclusion, the integrated model of aggression based on the stress-diathesis model is a relevant framework to study risk factors for aggression. Further research is needed to identify longitudinal predictors of directionality of aggression.