POPULAR ATTITUDES TOWARDS ALCOHOL USE AND ALCOHOLISM*

In a study involving individual verbal administration of a structured questionnaire to 1031 respondents comprising a random sample of general population, 18 years of age and older, of urban and rural Chandigarh and two villages in Jullundur district, Punjab, 45.0 per cent felt that people could drink “none at all” without it having a bad effect on their health, and 26.2 per cent thought that they could have a few drinks once or twice a month. To another question, 32.1 and 34.1 per cent felt that it was “normal” to have one drink and two drinks respectively, on any one occasion, and only 16.9 percent responded that it was “normal” to drink “none at all”. Alcoholics were identified by such behaviours as “being dead drunk”, “drinking too much”, having “arguments/fights” and being a “public nuisance”. Current users gave the most permissive and non-users the most restrictive responses as regards the norms of drinking.