MMPI Differences Between Alcoholics and Drug Abusers: Effect of Age and Race

• Published in: Psychological assessment 1990-03, Vol.2 (1), p.51-55
• Main Authors: Cannon, Dale S, Bell, William E, Fowler, D. Robert, Penk, Walter E, Finkelstein, Allan S
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Addictive behaviors; Adult and adolescent clinical studies; Alcoholism; Biological and medical sciences; Black People; Drug Dependency; Human; Medical sciences; Military Veterans; Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory; Psychology. Psychoanalysis. Psychiatry; Psychopathology. Psychiatry; Racial and Ethnic Differences; Substance Use Treatment; White People
• ISSN: 1040-3590; 1939-134X
• DOI: 10.1037/1040-3590.2.1.51

Inpatients in Veterans Administration substance-abuse treatment programs voluntarily took the Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory (MMPI) as part of a routine clinical evaluation. The alcohol-dependence-only group ( n = 207) were older ( M = 49.6 years) and had a higher percentage of White Ss (72.9%) than did either the drug-dependence group ( n = 49, M = 32.9 years, Whites = 53.1%) or a mixed alcohol- and drug-dependence group ( n = 160, M = 35.0 years, Whites = 60.0%). Previously reported differences between alcoholics and drug abusers in depression and psychopathy were obtained when age and race were not used as covariates, but no differences were found when the effects of age and race were statistically controlled. Mixed alcohol and drug abusers had somewhat more pathological MMPI scores than did alcoholics, even when effects due to age and race were partialed out.