Drinking motives of adult patients seeking treatment for problematic alcohol use

ABSTRACT

The Drinking Motives Questionnaire measures motives for alcohol consumption on four subscales. Coping with negative affect and enhancement of positive affect have been shown to be associated with high levels of alcohol consumption and alcohol-related problems. Few studies exist concerning drinking motives among treatment-seeking patients. The aims of the study were to investigate the factor structure of the shortened-form of the revised Drinking Motives Questionnaire, map main drinking motives, explore group differences in motives due to sex, age, level of drinking problems, and symptoms of depression/anxiety and to investigate whether different drinking motives predict alcohol-related problems in this group. There were 274 treatment-seeking patients recruited from four addiction treatment clinics in Sweden. The shortened-form of the revised Drinking Motives Questionnaire was administered in conjunction with a regular visit to the clinics together with measures of degree of alcohol-related problems, psychiatric symptoms, and demographic factors. Main drinking motives were identified. A confirmatory factor analysis was run to confirm the factor structure of the shortened-form of the revised Drinking Motives Questionnaire. A logistic regression using the Enter method was performed to investigate associations between predictors and Alcohol Use Disorder Identification Test scores. The results confirmed the four-factor structure reported in studies on non-treatment-seeking individuals. Coping was the most commonly expressed motive. Not previously found in a clinical sample, the results showed that coping motives, together with being male and having elevated anxiety scores, were associated to Alcohol Use Disorder Identification Test scores indicative of alcohol dependence. The shortened-form of the revised Drinking Motives Questionnaire is a brief and valid instrument that holds potential for clinical use in mapping drinking motives among treatment seekers.

KEYWORDS:

• Motives for drinking
• DMQ-R-SF
• alcohol dependence
• treatment seekers
• coping

Funding and support

The study was supported by funding from the Alcohol Research Council of the Swedish Alcohol Retailing Monopoly (grant no: FO2014-0021).