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Objectives: The purpose of this study was to examine the patterns of drinking and secondly, to identify the factors associated with problem drinking among male military personnel in Korea. Methods: Cross-sectional self-reported data were collected from a randomly stratified sample population of 3,224 soldiers, non-commissioned officers (NCOs), and officers who were employed in 37 units in the Korean military. Data were statistically analyzed using Chi-square test and multiple logistic regression analysis. Results: Among military men, 92.3% of officers, 91.5% of NCOs, and 73.8% of soldiers drank more than once a month. The prevalence of binge drinking and problem drinking was respectively 58.8%, 49.4% of officers, 61.0%, 51.8% of NCOs, and 32.3%, 27.0% of soldiers. In all, problem drinking was associated with socio-demographic and health related factors such as service, education, working years, smoking, injury, and stress level. Especially, ex and current smokers were most associated with problem drinking among all rank groups. Additionally, problem drinking of soldiers was associated with being a navy service, more educated, injured experience, and higher stress level and that of the NCOs was associated with years of working and higher stress level. Conclusion: The level of drinking of male military personnel was higher than male civilian and problem drinking was associated with certain socio-demographic and health related factors. Our findings suggest that effective intervention strategies to prevent problem drinking should be implemented across the military for rank specified group at greater risk and in conjunction with non-smoking, stress management and prevention of injury.

Objectives: This study examined the changes in alcohol beverage expenditure according to the type of household between the two periods (1990-2000 and 2000-2010). Methods: The data was taken from the raw data of alcohol consumption expenditure from 1990 to 2010 provided by Korea National Statistical Office. A t-test and regression analysis were performed using the SAS program. Results: The consumption expenditure elasticity and cross elasticity increased in the order of other households, all households, and salary and wage earners households. The consumption expenditure and alcohol expenditure increased gradually from 1990-2000 to 2000-2010, whereas tobacco expenditure decreased from 2000 to 2010. The consumption expenditure elasticity and cross elasticity in salary and wage earners households were higher than those of all households and other households. The consumption expenditure elasticity appears to be normal goods, and alcohol and tobacco are complementary goods. Conclusion: The consumption of alcohol increased during the period, 2000-2010. Therefore, alcohol policy and intervention programs are needed to decrease the consumption of alcohol.

Objectives: This study examines the effect of self-esteem on the self-sufficiency effectiveness and defines moderating effect of drinking, and then it tries to propose intervention methods to enhance the self-sufficiency effectiveness. Methods: For this purpose, the data was collected from 467 participants who belong to 27 local self-sufficiency centers out of 31 centers in Seoul. Descriptive analysis and Multiple-regression analysis were applied to test research hypothesis. Results: First, 124 (26.8%) of 467 participants had drinking problem over 12 points in AUDIT-K. Specially, 99 participants (19.9%) who have alcoholic problems over 15 points in AUDIT-K were needed immediate intervention. Second, there was a positive relationship between self-esteem and self-sufficiency effectiveness. It means that an intervention is necessary to enhance self-esteem for higher self-sufficiency effectiveness. Third, drinking had moderating effect within the relationship of self-esteem and self-sufficiency effectiveness. Drinking was negatively effects on self-sufficiency effectiveness. It means that an intervention is necessary against drinking for higher self-sufficiency effectiveness. Conclusion: Based on these research results, this study suggests that there is a necessity for intervention for the purpose of enhancement of self-sufficiency effectiveness.

Objectives: This study purposed to execute a forest therapy program for alcoholics’ spouses and to have opportunities for resolving conflicts among family members, enhancing sociability, and recovering self‐esteem through the program. Furthermore, we aimed to expand spouse programs, which have been merely self‐support meetings, and to lay the base for attempting various approaches. Methods: The items used in the forest therapy program consisted of spiritual health, depression, self‐esteem, forest effectiveness, etc. The program was executed for 6 days from the 20th to 25th of August, 2010, and a total of 46 subjects participated including 24 in the experiential group and 22 in the control group who did not participated in the experiment. Final data analyses used SPSS 15.1. Homogeneity between the experiential group and the control group was tested through χ²-test, t-test, and difference between the two groups in each item after the experience was analyzed through independent samples t‐test. Results: 1) Among the items of spiritual health, religious spiritual health, existential spiritual health, and overall spiritual health were statistically significantly higher in the experiential group than in the control group. 2) As to depression, the experiential group was categorized to be non‐depressed, and the control group showed light depression. 3) Self‐esteem was statistically significantly higher in the experiential group than in the control group. 4) According to the results of our experiment on forest effectiveness, the experiential group showed generally higher mean scores than the control group in emotional competence, spirituality, prospect of life, and overall forest effectiveness. Conclusion: These results presented above suggest that a forest therapy program can be effective in enhancing spiritual health, depression, self‐esteem, and forest effectiveness in alcoholics’ family members. As forest therapy programs were found to be adequate for helping the psychosocial adjustment of alcoholics’ family members, they may be useful and applicable to alcoholics’ families in the field.

Objectives: This study aims to investigate the relations of alcohol expectancy for social facilitation and tension reduction with life stresses and subjective well-being to provide useful information for intervention of drinking problem. Methods: The participants were 384 college students (189 males and 195 females) living in Seoul and suburbs, whose ages ranged from 18 to 31, and average was 21.79 (SD=2.05). Psychological testings were used to measure Alcohol Expectancy Questionnaire, Life Stresses Scale for college students, Emotion Frequency Test, Satisfaction with Life Scale, and Subjective Happiness Scale. Results: There was no significant gender difference in alcohol expectancy for social facilitation and tension reduction. Beside, they were likely to drink with alcohol expectancy for social facilitation than with expectancy for tension reduction. Alcohol expectancy for social facilitation as well as expectancy for tension reduction, more closely correlated with life stresses than subjective well-being. Stresses with future career accounted most variance of alcohol expectancy for social facilitation, and financial stresses was also significant predictor, while financial stresses accounted most variance of alcohol expectancy for tension reduction, and stresses with family and academic works were also significant predictor for it. Conclusion: The present study suggests that life stresses are more closely related to alcohol expectancies than subjective well-being. Among life stresses of college students, stresses with future career, financial problem, family, and academic works were critical factors for alcohol expectancies. It was discussed with previous studies and suggested the information for further studies, prevention and intervention of problem drinking.

Objectives: The purpose of the article is to examine distribution of alcohol advertisements expenditure in domestic media in 2009. Methods: The study monitored public TV, cable TV, radio, DMB, newspaper and magazine in 2009, and analyzed alcohol advertising expenditure in each media using ADEX system of TNmS (Total National Multimedia Statistics) Results: Findings indicated that the scale of domestic alcohol advertising was about 10 billion won (95,589,710,000) in 2009. Beer advertisements, the most popular alcohol product, accounted for 48.4% (4.63 billion won) of the total advertising expenditure for the year, and among types of media, newspaper accounted for 41.4% (3.94 billion won) of the total alcohol advertising expenditure. The findings reflected the seasonality, which showed more advertising between April and September and expenditure was the highest in July. Conclusion: Considering the previous research indicating the impact of alcohol advertising on drinking, current study findings imply a need for regulations on alcohol advertising as ell as continuous monitoring and surveillance. Also, findings point to the fact that harmful drinking prevention strategies need to consider seasonality of alcohol advertising.

Objectives: Alcohol dependence is a chronic condition with a high risk of relapse. The purpose of this study was to investigate the moderating effects of family support between relapse related factors and relapse among alcoholics. Methods: A total of 764 answers were collected from alcoholics who admitted to the hospital and a face to face survey by mental health social worker were conducted. Collected data were analyzed by frequency, t-test, one way ANOVA, moderated multiple regression. Results: First, major characteristics of subjects reported male, over 40 years old, no spouse, unemployment, dual-disorder, positive alcohol family history, 16.92 years old drinking onset, 5.84 admission for alcoholism treatment, 4.77 per weekly drinking. Second, younger age, no spouse, unemployment, higher weekly drinking, alcohol family history, family support were significantly related to the relapse. Third, family support moderated between weekly drinking and relapse of alcoholics. Conclusion: Based on these findings, the research discussion reinforced the importance of developing effective relapse prevention program of alcoholics and more practical focus on family recovering process.

Objectives: Because road traffic accidents are related in alcohol strongly, most countries prohibit drink-driving. Korea also prohibits drink-driving under the Road Traffic Act during the last 20 years. Continuous legislative efforts have been made to update and renew drink-driving laws, ordinances and regulations from 1989 to 2011, and this has resulted in the formation of the present legislations. But drink-driving is one of the major causes of deaths and injuries in Korea until today. The aim of this study is to analyze trends of drink-driving accidents, fatalities, and related indexes of Korea. Methods: We reviewed the Road Traffic Accident in Korea reported by Road Traffic Safety Authority from 1998 to 2010. For figuring out drink-driving related accidents we calculated accident rate, fatality rate, and injury incidence rate caused by drink-driving per 100,000 persons from 1998 to 2010. The other drink-driving related accidents indexes were calculated by the same criteria. The Road Traffic Acts, the Enforcement Ordinances, and Enforcement Regulations from 1989 to 2011 have been reviewed, put in order according to the landmarks of the laws. The periods of the drink-driving policy were divided into two stages according to big changes of the laws: the first stage is from 1999 to 2005 and the second stage is from 2005 to 2010. T-test was applied to compare means differences of rates between the drink-driving policy stages, and correlation co-efficient were calculated. Results: Means of drink-driving accident rate per 100,000 persons have been decreased from first stage to the second stage (p<.1). Mean of fatality rate per 100,000 persons of the first stage was 2.15 and the second stage was 2.88 (p<.1). Fatality rates have been decreased dramatically during the last 12 years, and correlation co-efficient was -.740 (p<.01). Drink-driving accidents rate of age group 16-20 has been decreased, but age group over 50 has been increased during the observational period. Conclusion: The drink-driving countermeasures in Korea were effective to reduce accidents and deaths caused by drink-driving. Although drink-driving accidents have decreased during the last 12 year, proportion of accidents among total road traffic accidents has been increased and is still high.

Objectives: This study intended to examine the characteristics of a therapeutic environment that patients perceived in alcohol dependence treatment and rehabilitation facilities. Methods: The subjects were 219 patients from 10 settings in 5 alcohol dependence treatment facilities. Data analysis was done with the SPSS 12.0 pc program for descriptive statistics. Results: Patients' illness severity showed significant differences in therapeutic environment mean scores. Patients in the open ward and rehabilitation ward had much higher perception scores than those in closed ward therapeutic environments. In particular, C hospital(open ward) and E community facilities were better rated for more active support, autonomy, personal expression, practical orientation, and program clarity than A hospital. Conclusion: To improve a therapeutic environment of alcohol dependence treatment and rehabilitation services, it is necessary to consider the illness characteristics of alcoholics and apply more open treatment settings and more specialized treatment programs.

Objectives: The aim of this study was to identify the patterns of alcohol consumption among middle aged and elderly persons and to examine the association between problem drinking and negative health consequences. Methods: Data analysis of the 2010 National Life Transition Period Health Examination Program was conducted for 6,971 participants aged 40 and 66 years old. Among participants, 3,573 were 40 years of age and 3,398 were 66 years of age. Social and demographic variables, alcohol use, binge drinking and negative experiences concerning alcohol drinking were assessed. AUDIT-K was utilized for determining harmful or hazardous alcohol use. The blood samples were taken from all participants to obtain AST, ALT and γ-GTP scores. Results: Of the participants, 29.48% screened positive for alcohol abuse and 2.83% for alcohol dependence. At risk alcohol use and binge drinking were more common among men 40 years of age relative to men aged 66 years old. In the 40 years old women group, 33.54% reported binge drinking once a week. On the other hand, 10.67% of the women aged 66 reported to drink alcohol more than 4 times a week, which is more frequent than women aged 40. Participants of at-risk drinking were 1.559 times more likely to have liver disease. As the severity of problem drinking increased, the probability of having liver disease also increased. Conclusion: Frequent and binge drinking were reported by middle aged and elderly adults. Different drinking patterns were also found between men and women and among the age groups. Therefore, a tailored intervention which addresses an individual's specific problems should be developed and implemented.

Objective: Problem drinking among female students has concerned in Korean society. This study is to identify drinking behaviors and to examine the factors affect problem drinking among Korean female high school students. Methods: The 2009 Korean Youth Health Risk Behavior Survey, a nationwide dataset collected by the Korean Center for Disease Control, was used for analyses. The data contained a total of 17,978 female students. Results: The rate of alcohol drinking experience and current alcohol drinkers were 68.2% and 37.5%, respectively. The prevalence of early drinking onset (before age 13) was 14.2% and the problem drinking (defined as 2 or more points in the CRAFFT) among current drinkers was 29.2%. The factors that affected problem drinking were self-reported academic performance, living status, drinking before the age of 13, and drinking amounts. Female high school students who had began drinking before the age of 13 (odds ratio=1.51) and drunken soju 5 glasses or more (odds ration 3.39) had higher risk of having problem drinking. after controlling for the covariates such as age, grade, self-reported academic performance and living status. Conclusion: The intervention for the prevention of problem drinking should be tailored and developed for environmental factors and early drinking onset

Objectives: In Thailand, little is known about the alcohol consumption and expenditures in the underage and adult populations at the national level. This study aims to determine amount and expenditure of the alcohol consumption categorized as the underage and adult excessive drinking. Methods: Data were obtained from the National Health Examination Survey 2003-04,a nationally representative sample of the Thai population aged 15 years and over (n=39,290). Excessive drinking was defined as the per week consumption of greater than 14 drinks for a male adult and 7 drinks for a female adult. Underage persons were those younger than 18 years. Based on the quantity-frequency approach, the consumption amount was computed as pure alcohol. Market prices were used for calculating the consumption expenditures. Results: A potential reduction in the underage and adult excessive drinking was estimated using sales data. Proportion of alcohol drinkers in the Thai population was 53.3%. About 35% of the underage population were the drinkers and 15% of the adults were the excessive drinkers. The underage and adult excessive drinkings accounted for 88% of total alcohol consumption and expenditures. This study revealed that if the underage drinking was eliminated and the adult excessive drinking reduced the consumption to the recommended limits, the total consumption and expenditures in Thai population would decline by 68.8%(181.9 million liters of ethanol) and 68.3% (132.2billion Baht), respectively. Conclusion: The findings signal a need for preventing underage persons and restricting adults from drinking. Proactive enforcement of alcohol controlling policies together with strengthening social norms to discourage the underage and excessive drinking is urged as a necessary strategy.