K N JAYAKUMAR et al.

/ (IJAEBM) INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF ADVANCED ECONOMICS AND BUSINESS MANAGEMENT

Vol No. 1, Issue No. 1, 006 - 013

Reliving the Past: Experiences of Adult Children of

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Alcoholics in Love Relationship
K N Jayakumar*
Ph.D. Research Scholar, Department of Psychology,
Periyar University, Salem -636 011
EB Tamil Nadu, India
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e-mail id: jayakumar1927@gmail.com

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 K N JAYAKUMAR et al. / (IJAEBM) INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF ADVANCED ECONOMICS AND BUSINESS MANAGEMENT
Vol No. 1, Issue No. 1, 006 - 013

Reliving the Past: Experiences of Adult Children of

Alcoholics in Love Relationship
ABSTRACT

Introduction: The capacity for love is a central component of all human societies. Love in all its
manifestations, whether for children, parents, friends, or romantic partners, gives depth to human relationships.
Although there is an assumption in much of the research that an individual‘s adult attachment style develops
from the relationship that individual has with his or her own parent, the association between early relationships
with parents and subsequent behaviour in love relationships has rarely been studied. Background: Studies have

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found that having at least one alcoholic parent disturbs the children and family relationships. Early attachment
relationship with a primary care giver is a prototype for later love relationships. Rationale: To know the kind
of experience they go through when they develop a love relationship later as adolescents or adults.
Methodology: The experiences in love-relationship of adults‘ of alcoholic parents and non-alcoholic parents
were studied by comparison. The purposive sample consisted of 200 (N) college student participants who were
involved in intimate relationship (heterosexual in nature). They were administered Children of Alcoholics
Screening Test (CAST) and Experiences in Close Relationships-Revised (ECR-R) questionnaire. Based on the
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CAST cut off scores (six and above) the sample was grouped into two i.e. a) adult children of alcoholic parent/s
(n1=86) and b) adult children having non-alcoholic parent/s (n2=114). Conclusion: When compared, the adults
of alcoholic parents had experienced significantly higher levels of anxiety and avoidance in their intimate love
relationships, than the adult children of non-alcoholic parents.

Key words: love, attachment, adult children, alcoholic parent, CAST, ECR-R
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 K N JAYAKUMAR et al. / (IJAEBM) INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF ADVANCED ECONOMICS AND BUSINESS MANAGEMENT
INTRODUCTION
Love is a deep and tender feeling of affection for or
attachment to one or more persons. Love
relationships include characteristics such as
fascination, sexual desire, and exclusiveness, such
that lovers tend to be preoccupied with their
partners in an exclusive sexual relationship [1].
The capacity for love is a central component of all
human societies. Love in all its manifestations,
whether for children, parents, friends, or romantic
partners, gives depth to human relationships. Love
makes people think expansively about themselves
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and the world. Making love relationships is not only
more rewarding, but also more frustrating too. Love
is a special form of reciprocal relationship or
attachment. The term attachment normally implies
strong liking or love for a person, but in the study of
psychology, the term refers to the special reciprocal
relationship [2, 3, 4]. People‘s romantic
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relationships and beliefs about love are similar with
the kind of attachment they formed with their
parents during childhood [5]. The way people
approach close relationships as well as their view of
love can be a reflection of their personal
development. The characteristic style of attachment
to their parents also influences their attachment
style, which is the typical style of becoming
involved with others. Securely attached people
believe it is easy to get close to others, and they
report happy and trusting love relationships, people
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with avoidant attachment style feel uneasy when
people get too close to them and anxious-
ambivalent style people desire a high level of
closeness, which they may not get [5]. People tend
to attach to their romantic partners as they did with
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their parents. One of the major tenets of Bowlby‘s
attachment theory [6] is that the experience of poor
relating to the parents during upbringing sets the
stage for difficulties in later relationships, and
ultimately represent a factor contributing to an
individual‘s vulnerability for psychopathological
disorders [7, 8, 9, 10]. The kind of attachment style
a person develops depends largely on the nature of
parents. Parents problem do affect the attachment
style. One of the many ills that affect parents is
alcohol. A large amount of research has been
carried out investigating the effect of parent‘s
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Vol No. 1, Issue No. 1, 006 - 013
alcohol problems on their families [11, 12, 13].
Parents‘ with alcohol problems have been reported
as having a detrimental effect on their families and
particularly on children. Higher levels of negative
events and lower levels of positive events (as
measured by the Children of Alcoholic Life-Events
Schedule, COALES) have been reported by high-
school students who self-reported having an
alcoholic parent [14]. Children of alcoholics
receiving treatment have also been reported to have
greater emotional disturbance, particularly anxiety
and depression, compared to children of recovered
alcoholics and children of non-alcoholic matched
controls [15].
Rationale
Early experiences of parental rearing, lead to the
development of internal working models of self and
others in relationship. Such internal models are
successively incorporated into the individual‘s
psychological organization [16, 17] and
significantly influence the quality, style, and course
of later relationships [18, 19, 20, 17]. Although
there is an assumption in much of the research that
an individual‘s adult attachment style develops
from the relationship that individual has with his or
her own parent, the association between early
relationships with alcoholic parents and subsequent
behaviour in love relationships has rarely been
studied. The quality of love relationship these adult
children of alcoholic parents develop later in
adolescence or adulthood and what they experience
in this relationship is a question, which requires
research attention. Must attachment behaviour
always transfer to an adult love partner is the
question that this study tries to explore.
METHOD
Objective and hypotheses
Attachment theory would predict that parents with a
secure attachment pattern, in contrast to their
insecure counterparts, would have the necessary
emotional resources to engage in positive child-
rearing behaviors consistent with an authoritative
parenting style. These behaviors should promote
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healthy expectations of close relationships.
According to Bowlby [6], during childhood
individuals form an ‗internal working model‘ a
mental representation of the relationship between
the self and others, in the process of interacting with
its attachment figures. These models serve as blue
print to guide the individual‘s behaviour in
attachment relationships. Poor parental care due to
alcohol use/abuse in the family during childhood
constitutes a major risk factor in psychosocial
development, affecting both the ability to relate and
psychological well-being in adulthood. Grown up
children or adults are likely to express these secure
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or insecure relationship patterns in any relationship,
and romantic relationships they formed may not be
an exception. Based on these collective
assumptions, the objective of the present study is to
compare and study the quality of love relationship
of adult children of alcoholic parents with that of
the children of non-alcoholic parents. This led to
the following hypotheses.
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1. Adult children of alcoholic parent/s will
experience significantly higher attachment
anxiety in their love relationships.
2. Adult children of alcoholic parent/s will
experience significantly higher attachment
avoidance in their love relationships.
Sample and Procedure
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200 College students from Bangalore who fulfilled
the following inclusive criteria i.e, 1) Currently are
involved in love relationship with opposite sex and
2) They have the awareness that their parent/s take
alcohol.
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Measures
CAST (The Children of Alcoholics Screening Test):
Jones and Pilat to identify the Children of
alcoholics who are either living with or lived with
the alcoholic parent/s developed the test. It
discriminates between the offspring of alcoholic
parent and the offspring of non-alcoholic parent.
CAST is a 30 item-screening test with a yes / no
response option. It has high reliability and validity
(Crobhach‘s alpha is 0.92 and test re-test coefficient
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Vol No. 1, Issue No. 1, 006 - 013
is 0.96). Six is the cut-off score and any
participant‘s score of six or above is more likely to
have an alcoholic parent. Item number 1, 2, 3, 4, 8,
9, 10, 12, 16, 19, 20, 22, 23, and 28 measures the
parents drinking problem. Item number 5, 6, 7, 11,
14, 15, 18, 24, 27 and 29 measures the personal
distress. Item number 13, 17, 21 and 30 measures
the responsibility for parental drinking. In addition,
item number 25 and 26 measures the alcoholic
mother.
ECR-R (The Experiences in Close Relationships-
Revised Questionnaire) developed by Fraley,
Waller, and Brennan (2000) to assess the
attachment style of the samples. It identifies two
dimensions of attachment, one dimension dealing
with anxiety about the relationship, and the other
dimension dealing with avoidance in the
relationship. The inventory is a self-administered
scale and has 36 items. ECR-R is designed to assess
individual differences with respect to attachment-
related anxiety (i.e., the extent to which people are
insecure vs. secure about the extent to which their
partner's availability and responsiveness) and
attachment-related avoidance (i.e., the extent to
which people are uncomfortable being close to
others vs. secure depending on others). Attachment
anxiety and avoidance subscales have 18 items
each, with a 7-point rating. The ECR instrument
shows high reliability and validity. The test-retest
had Cronbach‘s alpha rating of .93 for the Anxiety
scale and the .95 for the Avoidance scale.
RESULTS AND DISCUSSION
Table 1 Sample Size, Age, Gender distribution and CAST Mean and
Standard Deviation scores and t-value
Sampl CAST Cut-off
e Group Score Score t-value
Size
and Mean SD
Age in
yrs
N= 200 Adult children of Non-alcoholic 1.98 1.60 6 and -18.62
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Parents
(n1=114, Males = 52, Females = 34)
below p<0.001
=19.82
SD Adult children of Alcoholic Parents 10.65 4.08 Above 6
=1.67 (n2=86, Males = 76, Females = 38)
The sample consisted of 200 (N) participants aged
between 17 and 24 years with an average age of
19.82 years (SD = 1.67). Among the sample 72
were females and 128 were males. This shows that
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the sample consisted of adults. All the participants
were college students pursuing studies in different
disciplines of Arts, Science, Commerce and
Management. Participants who fulfilled the
inclusive criteria were administered the CAST and
the ECR-R questionnaire. CAST differentiates
those children/adolescents/adults of alcoholic
parents with those of non-alcoholic parents. Based
on the CAST cut-off scores, the sample was
grouped into two. Participants having an alcoholic
parent/s were grouped as Adult Children of
Alcoholic Parents (n1=86, males=52 and
females=34) and Participants having non-alcoholic
parent/s were grouped as Adult children of non-
alcoholic parents (n2=114, males=76 and
females=38). Non- alcoholic parent means they are
not problem drinkers, but they too take alcohol
occasionally/very rarely yet cannot be labeled as
alcoholics. The mean and t-value suggests that
CAST score for Adult children of alcoholic parents
was significantly higher than that of Adult children
of non-alcoholic parents. It could be drawn from
the above table that, children of the alcoholic
parent/s are at a disadvantageous position compared
to their counterparts in terms of family support and
stability, parental guidance, happiness, trust,
cohesiveness and mental health. From Bowlby‘s
perspective, these people would have developed an
inconsistent internal working model during their
childhood. This does not augur well for a health
psychosociodevelopment. An average score of
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10.65 in CAST shows the magnitude of the problem
they gone/going through.
The scores of adult children of non-alcoholic
parents are well below the cut-off score. This
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shows that their parents are occasional drinkers and
are similar to normal parents capable of maintaining
healthy relations in the family. Hence, the huge
difference in CAST scores between the groups.
Table 2 Mean, SD and t-value scores on Attachment anxiety subscale
for both the groups
ECR-R score for
Group n Attachment anxiety
Mean
Adult children of Non- 114 3.04
alcoholic Parents
Adult children of Alcoholic 86 4.25
Parents
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Vol No. 1, Issue No. 1, 006 - 013
Table 2 gives an overview difference between both
the groups on ECR-R subscale attachment anxiety.
There now appears to be a consensus that adult
attachment consists of these two dimensions:
Anxiety and Avoidance [21]. Attachment anxiety is
defined as involving a fear of interpersonal
rejection or abandonment, an excessive need for
approval from others, and distress when one‘s
partner is unavailable or unresponsive. Adult
children of alcoholic parents have high scores
(Mean = 4.25, SD = 0.06) compared to their
counterparts and the difference is significant
(p<0.001). Lovers are mostly preoccupied with the
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thoughts of their partners in an exclusive
fascinating relationship [1]. Instead, here we
discover these adult children of alcoholic parents
experiencing anxiety and distress. This anxiety
could be because of the poor ability to make and
maintain love relationships entangled with extreme
attitudes of inter-personal avoidance or dependence,
EB fear or anger having its roots in the flawed internal
working model created by them during their
childhood. This confirms the adverse childhood
experience due to inconsistent and insensitive
parenting affected by parental alcohol abuse.
Hence, the hypothesis ― Adult children of alcoholic
parent/s will experience significantly higher
attachment anxiety in their love relationships‖ is
sustained. Briere [22] describes the typical
upbringing of children in an alcoholic household,
writing that these children were ―deprivedof being
parented—instead living with one or more people
who could not be counted upon for safety, security
or nurturance‖ (p. 14). As a result, they experience
emotional anxiety. Even the adult children of non-
alcoholic parents have mild anxiety in love relations
and this needs research attention. The postulate that
entering into and maintaining love relations by
itself have a tinge of anxiety, which needs further
research.
Table 3 Mean, SD and t-value scores on the Attachment avoidance
t-value subscale for both the groups
ECR-R score for t-value
Group n Attachment
avoidance
SD Mean SD
0.50 -10.69 Adult children of Non- 114 2.92 0.51 -8.38
p<0.001 alcoholic Parents p< 0.001
0.60 Adult children of Alcoholic 86 3.75 0.47
Parents
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 K N JAYAKUMAR et al. / (IJAEBM) INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF ADVANCED ECONOMICS AND BUSINESS MANAGEMENT
The second hypothesis predicted, ―A dult children of
alcoholic parent/s will experience significantly
higher attachment avoidance in their love
relationships‖. Accordingly, adult Children of
alcoholic parents showed greater score on
attachment avoidance with a mean of 3.75 (SD =
0.47) compared to their counterparts of non-
alcoholic parents with mean score of 2.92 (SD =
0.51) and the independent t-test value of -8.38
suggested a significant difference, at p<0.001.
Attachment avoidance is defined as involving fear
of dependence and interpersonal intimacy, an
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excessive need for self-reliance, and reluctance to
self-disclose. The Adult children of alcoholic
parents tend to feel insecure in their love
relationship, hence the high scores. They are likely
to adopt ‗insecure‘ interpersonal strategies, which
involves either deactivation of the attachment need,
in order to be able to avoid the negative
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consequences expected when proximity is sought,
or hyperactivation of the attachment need, in order
to (re)gain proximity to an attachment figure [23].
More over adult children of alcoholic‘s are trapped
in the fears and reactions of a child and are forced
to be an adult without going through the natural
stages that result in a health adult [24]. Rivers [25]
points out that, ―si nce the family is the context in
which children usually learn to express their
feelings, to love and express affection and to trust
and to share intimate aspects of their lives, it is
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understandable that many adult children of
alcoholics have significant problems with
psychosocial adjustment.‖ Specifically, they show
―ext reme difficulty in sharing themselves in
intimate ways with other people‖. This could be
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probably explaining the anxiety they experience. By
reconfirming Freud‘s insight that early attachment
is the prototype of later relations, the finding adds
valuable knowledge for the therapists who deal with
relationship issues.
CONCLUSION
The study tried to pull together the earlier
experiences of adult children of alcoholics and their
quality of love relationships from a framework of
attachment theory. Attachment theory postulates
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Vol No. 1, Issue No. 1, 006 - 013
the development of internal working models of self
and others, because of a child‘s early transactions
with his/her attachment figures. These internal
working models greatly influence later
relationships. Presence of alcoholic parent
influences the development of interpersonal aspects
of Children and this in-turn influences their love
relationships. Experiences in Close Relationships
scale measures attachment anxiety and attachment
avoidance. People who score high on either or both
of these dimensions are assumed to have an
insecure adult attachment orientation. By contrast,
people with low levels of attachment anxiety and
avoidance can be viewed as having a secure adult
attachment orientation [26, 27, 28]. The study was
conducted on non-clinical population. The results
confirm that adult children of alcoholic parents
have more anxiety and avoidance in their love
relationships compared to their counterparts. The
reason could be the development of flawed internal
working model during their formative years of
psychosociodevelopment. This is in tune with the
finding of Deutsch, [29] that adult children of
alcoholics have difficulty with intimate
relationships and are emotionally isolated.
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