Ninth Edition CoverGraziano & Raulin
Research Methods (9th edition)

Phases of Research: Example #1
Children of Parents with Alcoholism

Idea-Generating Phase:

This study was stimulated by previous research. Many studies have shown that children of alcoholic parents (COAs) have a high risk for alcohol abuse and for psychological problems when they become adults. However, the researchers wondered if this is a direct relationship, in which parental drinking alone lead to alcohol abuse by their offspring.

Does parental Alcohol Abuse leads to Offspring Alcohol Abuse?

Are there mediating factors that can increase or decrease the effects:
[Parental Alcohol Abuse + Mediators leads to Offspring Alcohol Abuse]

Problem-Definition Phase:

The researchers identified several factors in previous studies as possible mediating variables, but those variables had not yet been systematically studied. The variables identified and the researchers' ideas about them are:

Parents' social class (SES): the greater resources associated with higher SES should reduce the effects.

Quality of the family environment for the growing children (i.e., conflict, supportive, etc.): a poor quality family environment is expected to be associated with more problems for offspring.

Gender of the children: it is expected that girls will be more sensitive than boys to the quality of the environment. Therefore, girls may be more affected than boys by the quality of the family environment

Parents' psychiatric status and personality characteristics: it is expected that serious emotional problems of parents, such as depression, will be associated with greater problems for the adult offspring.

In summary, this study hypothesizes that parental alcohol abuse poses a risk factor for alcohol and drug abuse in their offspring. Further, it is hypothesized that several factors (noted above) will be mediators and their presence and strength will increase or decrease the overall effect of parental drinking.

Procedures-Design Phase:

Participants: Participants are three groups of fathers and their adult offspring.

  • Fathers with alcoholism, but no other psychological problems
  • Fathers with depression, no alcoholism
  • Fathers with neither alcoholism nor other psychological problems (i.e., Normal Control Group).

Fathers and family environment quality were examined and five years later the offspring were examined.

Outcome Variables: The adult offspring in each father group was tested for:

  • drinking and drug use
  • psychological status (problems, etc.)
  • social adjustment
  • school achievement

Observation Phase:

Data were gathered through telephone interviews and face-to-face follow-up interviews using structured questionnaires.

Data Analysis Phase:

Statistical analyses were carried out to test differences between the groups and the correlations among variables.

Interpretation Phase:

As expected from the theoretical concepts that underlie the study

  1. Children of fathers with alcoholism were at higher risk for alcohol and drug abuse, behavioral-control problems, and academic difficulties (they had more of these problems than the grown children of the other groups). Thus, alcoholism in the fathers is a risk factor for psychological problems in their offspring.
  2. The effects were greatest for female offspring. Quality of family environment appeared to play a role and, as expected, affected girls more than boys.
  3. Socioeconomic status had a modifying effect (i.e., greater effects for lower SES).
  4. Psychological status of parents was not as important a factor as fathers' alcoholism.

Communication Phase:

The details of this study were communicated to other researchers in the following journal article:

Jacob, T., Windle, M., Seilhamer, R. A., & Bost, J. (1999). Adult children of alcohlics: Drinking, psychiatric and psychological status. Psychology of Addictive Behaviors, 13, 1, 3-21.