Causes and effects of alcoholism - Research Paper Example

Research has failed to reach consensus on the causes of alcohol abuse, but one cause due to which individuals become addicted to alcohol is that those who consume alcohol for a very long period of time become mentally dependant on it and if they try to stop consumption of alcohol they experience withdrawal symptoms and this dependence is recognized as one of the causes of alcoholism. There are other causes that may cause alcoholism, but research has failed to reach consensus on these causes. One of these causes is genetic factors that may result in alcoholism.

This means that certain individuals might be born with certain characteristics that may increase the risk of these individuals becoming involved in the act of alcohol abuse. Genetic factors may explain alcoholism among certain percentage of population, but it fails to explain the same behavior in various other populations. According to Kearney, genetic factors are one of the reasons due to which individuals abuse alcohol and the researcher even states that individuals belonging to families in which alcohol abuse was quite prevalent were at a higher risk of around three to four times to abuse alcohol (Kearney, 2011, p.257). Another possible cause of dependence on alcohol is the changes in an individual’s cognitive chemical balances due to continuous consumption of alcohol over a longer period of time.

Individuals who try to stop consumption of alcohol may experience decline in the chemical levels of norepinephrine and due to this the individual may experience higher levels of blood pressure as well as increase in heart rate and in order to counter this effect, the individual may resort to drinking higher levels of alcoholic drinks. A research was conducted by Hawley, in which the researchers identified that the levels of cerebrospinal fluid norepinephrine were higher among those who were trying to quit their addiction of alcohol consumption (Hawley, 1981). To a