The present study assessed 351 undergraduate subjects on
dimensions of parental alcohol abuse, childhood family
environment, childhood social support, current coping style,
current negative life experiences, current psychological
symptomatology, and current indices of drug and alcohol
abuse. Results indicated that, while paternal alcohol abuse,
in and of itself, was not related to any of the outcome
measures, maternal alcoholism was correlated with one
measure of alcohol abuse and three measures of drug abuse,
and was independently predictive of a portion of the
variance of one alcohol abuse measure among subjects. Early
environmental factors (family environment and low levels of
social support), as well as current coping style and current
negative life experiences, were found to be related to
psychological symptomatology and to indices of drug and
alcohol abuse. coping style was also found to be related to
early family environment and to childhood social support,
suggesting that coping style may have its developmental
roots in early environmental factors. An interaction between
paternal alcohol abuse and disengagement coping style was
shown to be predictive of a portion of the variance of
subjects' alcohol abuse. Interactions between maternal
alcoholism and low level of social support were predictive
of a portion of the variance of subjects' drug abuse.
next to an author's name indicates that all files or directories associated with their ETD are accessible from the Virginia Tech campus network only.
![[VT]](http://scholar.lib.vt.edu/images/ETD-db/restricted.gif)
