The Alcohol Responsibility Scale
Worell and Timility (1981)
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I more strongly believe that:
a. I can âmake itâ if I want to hard enough.
b. If the cards are âstacked against meââ I will never âmake itâ.
a. I am the victim of bad luck of fate.
b. I have chosen a poor solution to some of lifeâs problems.
a. I have learned to become an alcoholic.
b. Heredity played a major role in my becoming an alcoholic.
a. My drinking is a âdiseaseâ.
b. My drinking is a poor solution to problems in my life.
a. If I could understand why I got this wayâ I would be well on my way to becoming cured.
b. My behavior reflects what I lace the most value inÂĄXalcohol or familyâ jobâ etc.
a. I am âsickâ or âillâ.
b. I am âirresponsibleâ.
a. I was born to be an alcoholic.
b. The experiences I have had and how I have reacted to them played a large part in determining whether I would become an alcoholic.
a. I can be the biggest âcon manâ in the world.
b. I am the victim of society and others around me.
a. I am just no good and I probably never will be.
b. I can be rehabilitated but only with my help.
a. If I make up my mind to quit drinkingâ I can do it.
b. Without the âright breaksââ I donât stand a chance at being sober.
a. The Service is the main reason why I was forced in to drinking in the first place.
b. I can choose to refuse a drink even if others expect me to have a drink with them.
a. What happens to meâ as an alcoholicâ is up to me.
b. I donât have very much control over the direction my life takes.
a. My staying sober involves taking responsibility for my behavior and placing more value on sobriety than on drunkenness.
b. If I could get the âright breaksâ I could kick the habit.
a. I would give anything to stay sober.
b. If I placed more value on staying sober than in drowning my troubles in alcoholâ I would stay sober.
a. Other people can drive me to drink.
b. I have repeatedly chosen the easy way out of bad situations.
a. I can make the choice not to drink no matter how my parent have treated me.
b. My parents donât realize how much they have put me on the road to alcoholism.
a. Physical problems often cause me to drink too much.
b. My drinking too much often causes me physical problems.
a. If people understood me betterâ they would realize that I canât help myself.
b. I earn most of the contempt others show towards me.
a. I have made the choice of becoming an alcoholicâ not other people.
b. If society were differentâ I wouldnât have had to become an alcoholic.
a. I need a rehabilitation program that will help me.
b. I need to take an active part in my own treatmentâ whenever I seek help.
a. I have given my life over to alcoholism.
b. Alcoholism has taken over my life.
a. I certainly get a âraw dealâ in life.
b. I generally get what I ask for in life.
a. When pressure builds upâ I canât keep from drinking.
b. Even when things are toughâ I am responsible for staying sober.
a. I can control other people with my drinking behavior.
b. When I am drunkâ I am an easy victim of other peopleâs manipulations.
a. If anyone really cared about meâ I wouldnât have to drink.
b. If I cared enough about other peopleâ I wouldnât drink.
a. I canât justify my drinking by focusing on a ârough childhoodâ or a lost marriage.
b. A woman is the major cause of my being pushed into alcoholism.
a. I am responsible for choosing my way of life.
b. Things that have happened to me have pushed me towards alcoholism.
a. Alcoholism is a behavior problem that only I can change.
b. Doctors will soon find a cure for my drinking.
a. I have made the choice to drink or not to drink every day.
b. When a way of lifeâ like alcoholismâ took over my life it was almost impossible to change.
a. I canât excuse myself for drinking just because I get frustrated by other people.
b. When the hospital staff gives me a âbad timeââ they are driving me to drink.
a. My alcoholism was likely caused by my being influenced by other drinkers.
b. I have likely chosen the kind of friends that give me an excuse to drink.
The Alcoholic Responsibility Scaleâ as found in Lefcourt (1981).
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A Search of Academic Search Alumni Editionâ Academic Search Completeâ ERICâ Health Source – Consumer Editionâ Health Source: Nursing/Academic Editionâ MEDLINEâ Mental Measurements Yearbookâ PsycARTICLESâ PsycCRITIQUESâ Psychology and Behavioral Sciences Collectionâ PsycINFOâ and GoogleScholar indicates that this scale is not commonly used in the Locus of Control literature.
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The Alcohol Responsibility Scale seeks to measure the extent to which an individual places the locus of responsibility for problem drinking on the self or on outside forces. The scale consists of 24 items. Johnson and colleagues (1991) found this scale to be comparable to Rotterâs scaleâ with both scales showing alcohol relapse to be associated with an external Locus of Control.
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Furnham & Steele (1993). Measuring Locus of Control: A critique of generalâ children’sâ health- and work-related Locus of Control questionnaires. British Journal of Psychologyâ 84â 443-479
Johnsonâ E. E.â Noraâ R. N.â Tanâ B. & Bustosâ N. (1991). Comparison of two Locus of Control scales in predicting relapse in an alcoholic population. Perceptual and Motor Skillsâ 72â 43-40
Lefcourtâ H. M. (Ed.). (1981). Research with the Locus of Control construct: Volume 1: Assessment methods. New Yorkâ NY: Academic Press Inc.
