Without proper mental health treatment, Native Americans tend to self-medicate with drugs and alcohol. Substance abuse is more common among lower economic individuals. People who cannot cover their basic living expenses often feel helpless and hopeless. Drugs and alcohol become more appealing when people have low self-esteem, a poor social network and limited access to quality healthcare.
This is how many substance use disorders form — as a way to cope. Unfortunately, poverty is a very real problem on Indian reservations. Many are located far away from economic centers in the U. Some reservations participate in the gambling industry to generate income, though not all do. As we know, jobs have a huge impact on our identity and self-esteem. Depression is a risk factor for substance abuse.
Again, drugs and alcohol temporarily dull symptoms of depression, which is how patterns of abuse start. Native Americans may have unique qualities, but they can do just as well in addiction treatment as anyone else. Indian leaders like Joseph LaFlesche, chief of the Omaha in the early 19th century, outlawed alcohol when he saw its effects on his people, but successive leaders allowed its return.
Today the problem of alcohol abuse is often blamed on history. Instead, history itself has become the explanation. Unfortunately, the result of this diagnosis which is frequently used not only to explain addiction but also violence, low rates of education and high rates of poverty is that little can be done to change matters.
Who can fix generational trauma? But many Indian leaders believe that people inside of these communities are perpetuating the problem. So what can be done? The Federal Government is gradually reducing its caretaker role, and tribes are assuming greater authority over their own economic, social, educational, and health affairs. Furthermore, awareness is growing that solutions to social and health problems must be generated at the community level and those that have been imposed from outside will most likely be ineffective Beauvais and LaBoueff ; Oetting et al.
Perhaps the most powerful and effective solutions will come through a recommitment to traditional Indian values and beliefs. Combined with a concerted and consistent message from the many social support systems in Indian communities, that approach will, one hopes, lead to a substantial reduction in alcohol-related problems. Little research-based data exist about the factors that lead many, if not most, Indian people to remain sober or to regain their sobriety and lead fulfilling lives.
A great number of Indian people can drink socially and not incur serious problems. If more information could be gained about those groups of people, that knowledge could be applied to efforts to prevent alcohol abuse and alcoholism in the Native American population.
Research on alcohol problems among urban Indians also would be useful, because it would improve understanding of how contextual social variables affect the course of alcohol abuse.
In this article, drinking categories refer to the definitions used in the research cited. National Center for Biotechnology Information , U. Alcohol Health Res World. Fred Beauvais , Ph. Author information Copyright and License information Disclaimer. Fred Beauvais, Ph. Copyright notice. Unless otherwise noted in the text, all material appearing in this journal is in the public domain and may be reproduced without permission.
Citation of the source is appreciated. This article has been cited by other articles in PMC. Abstract The high prevalence of alcohol use and its consequences among American Indians may be attributed to a number of factors, including the influence of the European colonists who first made large amounts of alcohol available to Indians, as well as current social and cultural factors.
Comorbidity of Alcohol Problems and Mental Disorders Alcohol and drug abuse problems often are attributed to underlying psychological disorders; consequently, those disorders have been cited as contributing to alcohol problems among American Indians Mail and McDonald ; Novins et al. Causal Explanations for Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism The history of alcohol use among Indian tribes, as described earlier, sets the stage for the high rate of alcohol-related consequences currently reported for this population.
Genetic Risk Factors Evidence for a genetic component in the susceptibility to alcoholism has been increasing over the past three decades. Social and Cultural Influences Socioeconomic Factors The socioeconomic picture for many tribes is bleak. Boarding School Experience Until recently, most Indian children were removed from their homes sometimes forcibly, by social service agencies and placed in boarding schools that were often hundreds of miles from their families.
Loss of Culture Many Indian people believe that the loss of their culture is the primary cause of many of their existing social problems, especially those associated with alcohol. Cultural Forms Some researchers have suggested that current Indian drinking may be a product of the early ceremonial use of alcohol Abbott Attitudes and Expectancies American Indians appear to vary somewhat in their perceptions of alcohol and its effects.
Prevention and Treatment Understanding the factors that contribute to the high rate of alcohol-related problems in the Indian population is helpful in developing prevention and treatment strategies. Alcohol-Related Policies Prohibition has been the most prevalent policy in attempting to reduce alcohol consumption among Indian tribes, although it has been inconsistently applied. Conclusion American Indian and Alaska Native communities experience high rates of alcohol-related problems and have responded by implementing prevention and treatment programs, including both grassroots and externally sponsored programs.
Footnotes 1 In general, current drinkers are those who have consumed alcohol within the past year, but different researchers use different definitions. References Abbott PJ. Trends in drug use among American Indian students, — with an adjustment for dropouts. American Journal of Public Health. Cultural identification and substance abuse: An annotated bibliography.
Substance Use and Misuse. Indian adolescence: Opportunity and challenge. In: Montmeyer R, editor. Advances in Adolescent Development: Volume 9. Newbury Park, CA: Sage; in press. Drug and alcohol abuse intervention in American Indian communities.
International Journal of the Addictions. Drug use, violence, and victimization among white American, Mexican American, and American Indian dropouts, students with academic problems, and students in good academic standing.
Journal of Counseling Psychology. Policy implications for adolescent deviance: The case of Indian alcohol prohibition. Dissertation Abstracts International. Alcohol use among male and female Native American adolescents: Patterns and correlates of student drinking in a boarding school.
Journal of Studies on Alcohol. Navajo drinking: Some tentative hypotheses. Human Organization. The prevalence of alcohol abuse among American Indians and Alaska Natives.
Health Values. Trends in Indian Health— Rockville, MD: U. Department of Health and Human Services; Native renaissance: The survival and revival of indigenous therapeutic ceremonials among North American Indians. Transcultural Psychiatric Research Review. Traditional healing in the prevention and treatment of alcohol and drug abuse.
Psychosocial disorders of aboriginal people of the United States and Australia. Journal of Rural Community Psychology. Temperance board registration for alcohol abuse in a national sample of Swedish males born — Archives of General Psychiatry. Indian reservations, anomie and social pathologies.
Southwestern Journal of Anthropology. Drinking and drug use among Ontario Indian students. Drug and Alcohol Dependence. Psychiatric assessment and treatment of American Indians and Alaska Natives.
Hospital and Community Psychiatry. Fetal alcohol effects among North American Indians: Evidence and implications for society. Alcohol policy considerations for Indian reservations and bordertown communities. However, studies that follow people over time show that unemployment itself, particularly long term, also increases drug consumption and addiction.
On average, American Indians have their life expectancy cut by four years compared to whites In Indian country, every single one of these stressors is elevated. Over a quarter of Native Americans live in poverty, and the unemployment rate is double that for the rest of the population.
Research, in fact, links childhood adversity not just to addictions and other mental illnesses, but also to physical disease — including major killers like heart disease, stroke, and diabetes. Chronic stress matters because elevated levels of stress hormones can suppress the immune system and even damage brain cells. These effects are writ large among Native Americans. Diabetes rates are doubled; liver disease is quintupled.
Suicide rates are high. Indeed, the prevalence of major health problems is so high that on average, American Indians have their life expectancy cut by four years compared to whites.
For me personally, my aunt and uncle and mom — almost all of my [relatives] have some sort of early life diagnosis of disease. A lot of my cousins [have] lupus. Research on children of Holocaust survivors, for example, shows changes in reading instructions for genes related to stress. Some researchers who study native health talk about such "historical trauma" as a major reason for lingering disparities.
Spotlighting horrors like Wounded Knee allows people to overlook the conditions of native communities today. It can also imply hopelessness about the future, emphasizing permanent damage, not the chance of recovery. Gone cites a study published in in the Journal of the American Medical Association that clearly shows how much of a difference simply having more money can make. It followed a group of Cherokees who were part of a large research project on the development of addictions and other psychiatric disorders in rural and urban youth.
A relatively small amount of money had a big impact That relatively small amount of money had a big impact. For example, 35 percent of those who were 16 when the parents began receiving payments developed problems with alcohol or other drugs — but only 23 percent of those who were 12 did.
The year-olds were the youngest studied, but other research suggests that younger kids might do even better.
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