Blogging about Blogs

Over the course of our time spent on our semester research project, there are 8 questions we need to address in our oral presentation we will be giving at the end of the semester to our classmates.



1. The human population that I researched was substance abusers with a focus on alcoholism in particular.  I wanted to be able to through my research come to a better understanding of what this population of people affected by alcoholism goes through.  I wanted to find explanations for their actions and why it is they even start drinking in the first place, and what makes them continue to do so even when they are able to see that it may be drastically impacting their lives and others in a not so positive way.


2. My assumption for alcohol abusers was that they are all to some degree misguided and lacking in control of their actions (because their body or mind have become so heavily dependent on alcohol to get through the day) and this in turn does not make them the most pleasant of people to be around.  People who are alcoholics are depicted by their bad decision making skills while drinking because they have become inebriated through the consumption of the alcohol so it is likely that they would not make the best of decisions while consuming it.  I assume that to some degree it is their choice whether they continue their chronic use of the substance, since for the most part they choose to start it (though I know they did not start out with the thought 'I'm going to start being an alcoholic today').  And I assume that alcoholism has a drastic impact on the lives of those who are victim to its use and to those whose lives are affected by the actions of the alcoholic.  I also assume that people use it to compensate for stress in their lives or problems they are having.


3. I found that people who are chronic alcoholics often resort to drinking because they believe it will mellow them out and make them feel better, but often it is not that they are only stressed but also depressed and because alcohol is a depressant it only makes ones depression worst instead of better.


4. I would have to say that some challenges this group faces in mainstream society is that they are assumed to automatically have more control over themselves and their actions than what they really do have.  For some alcoholics it is not just a choice of choosing to drink or not to drink, sometimes the amount in which their body has become addicted to alcohol is stronger than their rational reasoning skills.  So I would say people might to easily condemn them and think they don't want to change or they don't want to be helped, and for some this may be true but for others they have become victims to their alcohol use and just find it harder to stop.


6. I would say the challenges that people would find in doing library research and original research on this population is possibly finding information that deals directly with the factor of alcoholism that you are searching for.  And I would say that it can be hard to find information that is truly unbiased on alcoholism because I have come across a few books and articles that just completely labels them the scum of the earth, who are violent and nasty people.  And of course those sources are very biased in the direction that alcoholism is wrong and it should not happen, and that is in part what makes alcoholics underrepresented in society.  We have made it a legal thing in our society so in some ways one would think it odd that it could be so condemned when it is a substance that can be used without any legal repercussions (also long as you’re not belligerent on it)


7. After learning more about my human population the research question I have generated on them is “Why is alcoholism so prevalent in society?” and it is an ongoing investigation because I have been preoccupied with other research questions I came up with that are linked to that question, and I found it sometimes hard to search for information that dealt with that question but Professor Wexelbaum has given me some tips on which to help me with my research question search string.  So hopefully I will be able to gather more information on the subject.