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Promises behavioral health1/16/2024 government began studying alcoholism and the medical community, led by Dr. The World Health Organization and the U.S. Technically the American Association for the Cure of Inebriety first put forth the disease model of addiction in 1870 with its founding principle, “Inebriety is a disease.” However, it didn’t rise in prominence until the founding of Alcoholics Anonymous in 1935. With the repeal of Prohibition in the United States in 1933, the moral and temperance models fell out of favor. These institutions generally did not offer the help alcoholics needed. Courts and families sent alcoholics to drunk tanks in the city jail, asylums and public hospitals. During this time and throughout Prohibition (1920-1933), society and lawmakers viewed alcoholism from a social-rather than medical-perspective. In the years leading up to Prohibition, a number of states began passing laws that mandated the sterilization of those they considered “defectives”–the mentally ill, developmentally disabled, and alcoholics and addicts. While the temperance movement placed the blame on alcohol rather than the user, it also propagated the idea that alcohol was evil and sinful (a moral view). The temperance movement hit its stride in the United States during the mid-1800s, and alcohol became a thing to be feared. Alcoholics were reluctant to publicly acknowledge their problem, as society had little sympathy for their struggle. Rather than proposing treatment methods for alcoholism, the moral model of addiction viewed punishment as a more appropriate response. In the 19th and early 20th century, society associated alcoholism with other socially undesirable situations and behaviors such as crime, poverty, sin, domestic violence, and laziness. Unsurprisingly, viewing addiction as a moral failing led alcoholics and other addicts to be grouped with others who had demonstrated “moral failings”. The Moral Model’s Impact on Alcoholics and Addicts The implication is that addiction is the result of poor choices which addicts make because of a lack of willpower or moral strength. It doesn’t recognize biological or genetic components to addiction and offers little sympathy for those who display addictive behaviors. The moral model frames addiction as a result of human weakness-a defect in character. But one of the first models for addiction, and one that set the tone for decades to come, was the moral model. In recent years, as science has discovered more and more biological and genetic factors involved in conditions like alcoholism, models that stress these viewpoints have become more popular. Throughout history, the favored model has changed many times. There are a number of models that have been posed in an effort to understand and explain addiction. However, it’s an idea that draws a mental picture of what addiction is. A model of addiction isn’t a physical thing we can tough (like a globe). You’d be better looking at the globe to understand our world. A flat-world model is also a model of the world it’s just not accurate. What Is the Moral Model of Addiction?īy model, we simply mean a way of viewing of something. But it is also good know moving beyond the moral model of addiction. Unfortunately, it has led to stigma and intolerance and kept many people from seeking help. This is true of the moral model of addiction, a psycho-social explanation of addiction. In these instances, our need for explanation interferes with our ability to see and interact with the world and other people clearly and effectively. But sometimes our classifications are too rigid and our explanations just aren’t right. It helps to identify with other people, provides a framework for understanding problems like addiction and often leads to remarkable insight into the world, the human body, and human nature. Explaining and classifying situations, behaviors and other people can certainly be beneficial. We also do it on a larger scale in fields such as psychology and medicine. We do this individually in our everyday lives. As human beings, we strive to make sense of the world and our place in it-it is a part of human nature. That’s what the moral model of addiction does for us. We need an explanation for why people do the things that addicted people do.
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