Alcohol dependence is a disorder in which an individual has an uncontrollable strong craving for alcohol yet they need to consume a higher amount to attain same results as an average person. Furthermore, failure to consumption of alcohol leads to the persons suffering from withdrawal symptoms. Therefore, even if the individual suffers as a result of consuming alcohol, they cannot readily quit. The disorder cannot be tied to one specific cause because it varies from one individual to the other. Nevertheless, some of the common reasons include graduation from habitual alcohol consumption and genetic inheritance from alcohol-dependent family members (Heather, Peters, & Stockwell. 2001). On the other hand, sociological perspective refers to the categories of analysis of social phenomena as used by the sociologist. As such, some of the common sociological aspects include symbolic interactions, functionalism and conflict theory. These perspectives are used by the sociologist to help the society understand phenomena from different dimensions (Marsh, 2014). Alcohol dependence as viewed from a social perspective exhibits it causes, the interaction of the individuals with the society, expectation from the community and effects on their day to day life. This paper discusses the sociological perspective of alcohol dependence. The sociological perspectives addressed are functionalism, symbolism, and societal conflict.
Functionalism or the functionalist perspective is credited to a French sociologist by the name Emile Durkheim. According to Marsh, (2014), this sociological perspective is based on the theory that each member of the society is special and bears a unique role. The approach focuses on the analysis of peoples’; shared experience, their societal perspective, their ability to uphold societal values and beliefs and finally, their behavior. All the factors as mentioned earlier enable them to feel that they are part of a group. As such, in functionalism it is argued that the main goal of individuals in a society is working together for the overall success of the group: Group, in this case, referring to the society. Alcohol dependence, on the other hand, can be analyzed based on the mentioned criteria by focusing on shared experience, societal perspective, individual’s ability to uphold societal values and beliefs and their behavior.
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It is clear that alcohol dependence leads to an uncontrolled craving for alcohol, therefore the lack of control individuals’ experiences as a result of being drunk, more often leads them to have a negative shared experience with other society members. The leading cause of negative shared experience is the wrong interpersonal relationship alcohol dependence breed with other society members as a result of having less self-control. According to Janvale, Kendre and Mehrotra, (2014), some of the collective actions and areas that elicit a terrible interpersonal relationship include the inability to settle debts on time or even not to pay, inability to maintain personal hygiene, mismanagement of funds that were meant for other societal functions on alcohol and using abusive language. The compromised shared experience makes the unique role each member of the society plays compromised since they cannot accomplish what the community demands of them. Upholding society value, on the other hand, deals with how the individuals observe and abide by what the society considers good for them. Alcohol dependants have a problem of not upholding society values. Intoxication caused by consumption of alcohol compromises their judgment and loosens there moral standard. In the intoxicated state, alcohol dependents are prone to break most of the societal values. As a result, they bear the adverse treatment associated with people who do not uphold society values that include being sidelined among the community. Behavior on the other hand analyses on how individuals behave in the society.
Since alcohol affects the mental activity of an individual by compromising their judgment either directly or indirectly, behavior widely defines alcohol dependants. First of all, it is easy to tell whether one is drunk or sober. One's judgment heavily relies on how the individual in question is behaving. More often, alcohol dependants are associated with bad behavior ("Anxiety and Depression in Alcohol Dependence Syndrome", 2017). This association to bad behavior is not by chance because consumption of alcohol compromises their self-control. Therefore they are prone to making decisions’ that they would have otherwise not made when sober. Despite the fact that it is understood that the bad behavior is as a result of being drunk, their action becomes their norm making alcohol dependants bear the brand of possessing lousy behavior even when they are sober. Lastly, alcohol dependants are more likely to wander away from the societal beliefs. Their compromises self-control makes them choose wrong decisions that would have otherwise been avoided had they been sober. Consequently, they suffer from penalties set by the society for wandering away from the long-held belief. Another perspective of discussing alcohol dependence is symbolism.
Introduced by George Herbert in 1920s, symbolism is a social perspective that analyses the subjective meanings given to objects, behavior and events. As such, it is believed that peoples’ thought of human interpretation of one another is not necessarily true but a belief of what they are. Alcohol dependence is no exception because it carries socially defined meaning that either worsening its negative impact on the society or otherwise. First, one of the social constructs on alcohol dependency is the belief that it for the affluence. These believe is by far a huge misconception because the disorder affects both the rich and the poor. Additionally, the disorder not only emanated from consumption of alcohol for leisure instead some cases are known to be genetically inherited from other members of the family lineage. The inheritance has nothing to do with whether one becomes rich or poor. Hence, alcohol dependence is best understood as a disorder that can affect any person irrespective of their social status, gender and level of education. The second belief is that alcohol dependence is a personal choice. Whereas many addicts start abusing alcohol willingly and derive pleasure from the initial low levels of consumed alcohol, its dependence is beyond their control. As mention in the introduction, the individuals have a craving for alcohol, yet they need larger amounts of alcohol to get drunk. Failure to consume it leads to adverse withdrawal symptoms characterized by suffering and unless they are medically treated, the suffering can be only be reduced by consuming alcohol. As such, unless they acquire medical assistance they cannot willingly free themselves from their predicament (Ollat, Parvez, & Parvez,1990). The belief that alcohol dependants suffer out of choice closely relates to the belief that it is possible to have controlled drinking.
Many people start drinking alcohol casually with the belief that they can manage the amount of alcohol they drink and stick to it. However, in no time they realize that they need to increase the amount of alcohol consumed to attain the same effect. In the long run, they are trapped by the withdrawal symptoms whenever they try to quit. At this stage, they experience all the three characteristics of alcohol dependence which are craving for alcohol, increased volumes to get drunk, and withdrawal symptoms whenever they miss it. It is widely conceived that drinking alcohol relieves the painful experience and after one stops drinking the entire painful situation would have gone away. Nonetheless, management of stress requires good methods. Whereas consuming alcohol may make one stop thinking of the pain in question due to suppression of mental activity, once its effect is over, the pain or stress will still be there unresolved("Anxiety and Depression in Alcohol Dependence Syndrome", 2017). In the long run, the individual will take more alcohol to continue enjoying the mental peace, and in the net effect, they become addicted. Therefore, it is important for individuals to deal with stress, depression or any cause of pain in a healthy manner rather than falling for the belief that consuming alcohol will solve their problem (Ollat, Parvez, & Parvez,1990).
Alcohol dependence can be analyzed using the social conflict theory. The theory was developed by Karl Marx. It states that societal conflict comes from the uneven sharing of resources, status and power. The created conflicts fuels change within the society. In relation to alcohol dependants, the individual have a tendency of feeling inferior and sometimes stigmatized. As such, they turn to drinking alcohol to ease the disturbing thought of feeling inferior. Clearly, this pattern worsens their case making them more Alcohol dependant. Another Dimension of the social conflict is the inability of the poor to get drunk considering the financial implication of alcohol. Therefore, the poor resort to illicit or cheap brands and drink till they are completely drunk as a demonstration that they can also afford alcohol. Another form of societal conflict is where non-alcohol dependants consider themselves more superior to alcohol dependants, this conflict results in alcohol dependants using the being drunk state as a defense against wrongdoing. For instance, a person who commits murder while drunk gets a more lenient sentence compared to their sober counterpart. On the other hand, take an example of two employees at a workplace. Keeping qualification constant, the sober employee is likely to revolt for better terms than the alcohol dependence basing on the fact that they have a societal conflict of not being equal. The conflict escalates to areas like reduced reliability in group tasks (Vedantam, 2010).
Bringing all the three perspectives into context alcohol dependence affects the society negatively. For instance, from the functionalism point of view, major topics such as parenting remain unresolved. Evidently, alcohol-dependent parents predispose their children to a lot of risks ranging from passing the undesirable behavior to their children to inadequate provision of basic needs. Furthermore, it has been noted that alcohol dependence contributes to domestic violence. Domestic violence is against many societies values. Analysis from the economical point of view, the nation as a whole loses a lot of revenue to alcohol dependence. The loss is associated with misused funds, reduced the productivity of individuals and usage of funds that would otherwise be channeled to development on treating alcohol dependants. Finally, alcohol dependence increases criminal cases. Most of the victims resort to committing a crime to facilitate their procurement of alcohol. On the other hand, their compromised mental functionality has driven many individuals to crime such as causing road accidents, sexual assaults, and physical assaults. Despite all the negative aspects associated with alcohol dependence, it is worth noting that the disorder can be treated and individuals made to enjoy a normal life. Nonetheless, it requires the cooperation of the society and willingness from the affected individual ("The Social Effects of Alcoholism", 2018).
From the discussion, it is clear that alcohol dependence as discussed based on the three social perspectives covers its causes and effects. The three aspects discussed are functionalism, symbolism, and social conflict. To begin with, the theory of functionalism indicates that every member of the society posses a unique role in the community. However, alcohol dependence compromises the ability of the individuals to participate in the overall success of the society. As such, their behavior, their relations, values, societal perspective and observation of societal beliefs are compromised. As a result, there is need to encourage individuals to engage in practices that do not predispose them to alcohol dependence. Secondly, symbolism looks at the subjective meaning, behaviors, and actions given to alcohol dependence. From the discussion on this perspective, it is clear that there are beliefs that introduce and makes many alcohol dependants trapped in disorder. Furthermore, it acknowledges that alcohol dependence is a disorder and the affected individuals can not quit whenever they want unless they receive medical assistance. Lastly, members of the society are warned against thinking that controlled drinking exists. Once one starts drinking their body adjusts the amount of alcohol required to get them drunks and further inflicts withdrawal symptoms whenever they want to quit. Lastly, from the social conflict perspective, Alcohol dependants are thought to be inferior compared to sober individuals as such. They take advantage such attracting reduced penalties. Nonetheless, their internal conflict between the rich and the poor leads to consumption of illicit brews endangering their life.
References
Anxiety and Depression in Alcohol Dependence Syndrome. (2017). International Journal Of Science And Research (IJSR) , 6 (1), 2282-2286. doi: 10.21275/art20164636
Heather, N., Peters, T. J., & Stockwell, T. (2001). International handbook of alcohol dependence and problems. Chichester [u.a.: Wiley.
Janvale, G., Kendre, S., & Mehrotra, S. (2014). Mental and Behavioural Disorders Related to Alcohol and their Effects on EEG Signals. Procedia - Social And Behavioral Sciences , 133 , 116-121. doi: 10.1016/j.sbspro.2014.04.175
Marsh, I. (2014). Theory and practice in sociology. [Place of publication not identified]: Routledge.
Ollat, H., Parvez, S., & Parvez, H. (1990). Alcohol and behaviour: Basic and clinical aspects . Utrecht, Netherlands: VSP.
The Social Effects of Alcoholism. (2018). Retrieved from https://www.promises.com/resources/addiction-articles/social-effects-alcoholism/
Vedantam, S. (2010). The hidden brain: how our unconscious minds elect presidents, control markets, wage wars, and save our lives. Choice Reviews Online, 48(01). http://dx.doi.org/10.5860/choice.48-0575
