Coping Behavior and Depressive Symptoms in Adult Children of Alcoholics

Abstract

This paper examined whether adult children of alcoholics (ACOAs) would report more depressive mood symptoms as compared to non-ACOAs, whether coping behaviors differed as a function of ACOA status, and whether specific coping behaviors were related to depressive mood symptoms in ACOAs. Participants were 136 college students categorized as ACOAs and 436 college students categorized as non-ACOAs as determined by scores on the Children of Alcoholics Screening Test (CAST; J.W.Jones, The children of alcoholics screening test: test manual. Chicago: Camelot). As compared to non-ACOAs, ACOAs reported significantly more symptoms of depressive mood as measured by the Profile of Mood States (POMS; McNair, Lorr, and Droppleman, POMS manual: profile of mood states. San Diego, CA: Edits). On the COPE Inventory (Carver, Scheier, and Weintraub, Assessing coping strategies: a theoretically based approach. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 56:267–283), ACOAs reported higher use of the following coping strategies: Behavior Disengagement, Denial, Focus on and Venting of Emotions, Humor, and Substance Use. For both the ACOA and non-ACOA groups, the use of Positive Reinterpretation and Growth and the use of Planning were significantly associated with fewer depressive symptoms, whereas Mental Disengagement, Focus on and Venting of Emotions, Denial, Behavior Disengagement, Substance Use, and Suppression of Competing Activities were associated with higher depressive mood scores.