Report: One in ten Finns suffered from growing up amidst family substance abuse

print this

According to a recent study compiled by A-Klinikka (The A-Clinic Foundation), one in ten Finnish people have suffered from childhoods spent in families with substance abuse problems. In the Finnish context, this overwhelmingly refers to the use of alcohol rather than narcotics or other drugs. The figures are revealed in research related to A-Klinikka's Lasinen Lapsuus ("Glass Childhood") project.
      Some 4% of respondents said they had experienced problems only during childhood, another 4% said the problems had travelled with them into adult life, and a further 2% had actually sought professional help for the traumas that arose from their parents' drinking.
      In addition a further 9% noted that the family drank too much, but that it had not caused them lasting problems personally.
      According to the A-Klinikka information officer and the compiler of the research paper Teuvo Peltoniemi, this is a national health problem on a large scale.
     
The previous similar study was carried out in 1994. Comparisons of the results would suggest that against the background of rapidly-increasing alcohol consumption, the situation has improved somewhat, but the numbers of those who believe they grew up in a family where substance abuse was commonplace have not declined.
      The study encouraged respondents to determine themselves whether they had lived in such families or not. Peltoniemi argues that subjective truth is more significant in this instance that the definitions of outside experts.
     
Most of the problems associated with living in a household where the parents are frequently drunk are related to feelings of insecurity and fear.
      The "Glass Childhood" project is currently developing an online service that will be launched for professionals working with substance-abuse families from the beginning of 2006. At the end of next year, a similar service will be introduced for the children of such families.
     
The numbers are significant: there are more than 100,000 children in Finland who suffer from their parents' excessive use of alcohol or drugs.
      In addition, some 400,000 adults carry the same memories, and a large share of them also carry the traumas of a childhood spent living with drunks.
      It also appears as though alcohol abuse is socially hereditary, in the sense that those who grew up in families with heavy use of alcohol tend to drink more as adults than do the children of families where alcohol was consumed only in moderation.
      The latest study involved responses from 1,005 Finns over the age of 15, and was performed last spring.


Links:
  A-Klinikka (A-Clinic Foundation)

Helsingin Sanomat