Personality differences between alcoholics anonymous members and nonmembers.

The purpose of this study was to determine whether there are personality differences between members of Alcoholics Anonymous and nonmembers . A total of 91 alcoholics who were active members of A.A. and who had completed at least six months of abstinence were matched by race and sex with 91 alcoholics who had recently completed alcoholism treatment and who were not A.A. members. Four scales of the Eysenck Personality Questionnaire ( EPQ ), measuring toughmindedness , emotionality, extroversion and " fakability ," were administered to both groups. A 2 X 2 X 2 multivariate analysis of variance was performed using sex (men, women), race (American Indian, Caucasian) and group (A.A., non-A.A.) as the independent variables and the four EPQ scales as the dependent variables. The main effects of race and group were significant, but none of the interaction effects was significant. American Indian alcoholics were significantly more toughminded than the Caucasians. A.A. members were significantly more extroverted and less toughminded and emotional than nonmembers .