Consommations d’alcool, de cannabis et de tabac et qualité d’attachement

Abstract

Substances’ consumption among young adults is a major public health problem. In the scientific literature, the links proposed with substance abuse are mostly biological, psychological and environmental. Some authors proposed to analyze these consumptions in connection with the parents-children's relationships as well as the way individuals cope with problems and regulate emotions. The present study aimed to investigate the link between alcohol consumption and attachment style. Additionally, this study wanted to investigate what are the relationships between attachment style and the tobacco and cannabis, two psychoactive substances present in polyconsumption with alcohol. We hypothesized that alcohol consumption is correlated with insecure-preoccupied attachment, that cannabis use is correlated with insecure attachment-detached and that tobacco consumption is correlated with insecure attachment in general. In order to test this, we used the AUDIT to measure the alcohol consumption, the Fagerstrom scale to measure tobacco use, the CAST to measure the consumption of cannabis, the RSQ and RQ for measuring attachment, among 88 people recruited on an internet specialized site. We counterbalanced the questionnaires in two sequences to control the possible effects of the subjects’ attachment system activation. In our sample, there are positive significant correlations between the consumptions of alcohol and cannabis (r=.45, P=.02) and the consumptions of cannabis and tobacco (r=.51 P=.03). Comparison analyzes of attachment dimensions and alchool consumption, have shown that subjects with no harmful consumption (M (E-T)=2.94 [.82]) have significantly higher means in the preoccupied attachment dimension (RSQ) ([F(2)=3.16; P=.05]) than those with harmful drinking (M (E-T)=2.38 [.61]). Subjects with harmful consumption (M (E-T)=3.23 [1.30]), in turn, tend to code higher in the detached scale (RQ) (F(2)=2.90; P=.06) than subjects with no harmful consumption (M (E-T)=2.39 [1.21]). On the other hand, correlation analysis between cannabis use and insecure-preoccupied attachment (RSQ) show that these variables tend to be inversely correlated (r=–0.31; P=10). No other significant differences or correlations were observed between attachment dimensions and the different types of alcohol consumption, tobacco or cannabis consumption. The importance of the study is discussed on the light of the link found, in our sample, between alcohol and cannabis consumption and the two subtypes of insecure attachment, preoccupied and detached.