Addictive behavior and its forms – what prevention is most effective

What is addiction

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Addiction is an irresistible attraction to something, that is, to objects, substances, even people.

There are several signs of addictive behavior:

• a person feels the need to perform certain actions, without which he feels discomfort;
• directs all his activity precisely towards satisfying his addiction, while refusing self-development, relegating any other life goals and dreams to the background;

• a person loses social connections, they lose significance for him;
• denies the fact that he has a problem;
• suffers setbacks in his career, personal life, in severe cases of addiction he finds himself in a situation of financial disadvantage, since all his money is spent on satisfying his addiction.

The more a person indulges in their addictive behavior, the more it gets worse. The body quickly adapts, so a person has to increase the “dose” more and more. Ultimately, the body can no longer exist without the source of its dependence, and the person gets used to it both psychologically and physiologically.

And if earlier a person understood that, if necessary, he could control himself, then, unnoticed by himself, he loses this control. His life begins to be completely subordinated to additive behavior.

What is addiction in psychology - types, stages of formation and prevention in adolescents and adults

People, other objects and phenomena of the surrounding reality that cause various emotional states.

Escaping reality is always accompanied by strong emotional experiences.

Having put a person on an “emotional hook”, it is very easy to control him. Emotions are part of addiction. A person actually depends not on the drug, but on emotions. The stronger the emotion, the stronger the addiction.

Depending on the means by which escape from reality is carried out, alcohol addiction, drug addiction, substance abuse, drug addiction, tobacco smoking, gaming addiction, workaholism, computer addiction, sex addiction, and food addiction are distinguished.

All these types of behavior are nourished by the powerful force of the subconscious and this gives them such qualities as irresistible attraction, exactingness, insatiability and impulsive unconditionality of fulfillment.

Addictive behavior is characterized by a wide range of pathologies of varying severity from behavior bordering on normal to severe psychological and biological dependence.

The main cause of all addictive disorders is a controversial topic that has not yet been revealed.

Addictive behavior from the point of view of classical psychoanalysis (Sigmund Freud)

“Classical psychoanalysis views individual behavior as the result of the interaction of three key personality subsystems: id, ego and superego.”

Where the id is “the unconscious, mental, it is saturated with the energy of drives and instincts, primarily sexual. The ego is the psyche connected with the outside world, controlled by the id, in accordance with the requirements of reality. Superego is a system of values, social norms, ethics.” When the demands of the Ego, the Id and the Superego do not coincide with each other. And what’s more, they contradict each other; a personal conflict arises. And if the Ego cannot rationally cope with this conflict, then the person includes psychological defense mechanisms.

If the psychological defense mechanisms do not help, then the person uses objects that can console him (take him into the world of illusions, where there are no problems). Gradually he gets used to them and becomes dependent on them.

Also, to understand addictive behavior, psychoanalysts turn to the sexual stages of personality development. Thus, “in people who have problems such as overeating, smoking, talkativeness, and alcohol abuse, psychoanalysts note fixation at the oral stage of sexual development (oral fixation of pleasure).” And psychoanalysts consider such a phenomenon as drug addiction “as masturbation, which is the main form of sexual activity in adolescence.”

Addictive behavior from the point of view of ego psychology (E. Erikson)

Central to the theory of ego psychology created by Erik Erikson is the proposition that: during his life, a person goes through eight stages that are universal for all humanity.

Each stage occurs at a specific time for it (the so-called critical period), and a fully functional personality is formed only by passing through all stages of development. The characteristic model of a person’s behavior depends on how he will solve crises at a given stage of development. From the standpoint of ego psychology, dependent behavior is explained as an unresolved conflict between dependence and independence (autonomy).

Also, from the point of view of ego psychology, the emergence of addictive behavior is influenced by the problem of identifying one’s self.

Addictive behavior from the point of view of individual psychology (Alfred Adler)

"A. Adler was the first to draw attention to the phenomenon of inferiority as a source of self-improvement.” He believed that in order to understand human behavior, it is necessary to find out in what ways a person feels inferior and how he overcomes his inferiority, as well as what goals he sets when overcoming it. From the point of view of individual psychology, addictive behavior is an escape from reality caused by a person’s desire to overcome his inferiority complex.

Addictive behavior from the point of view of the phenomenological direction of humanistic psychology (Carl Rogers)

The phenomenological direction denies that the world around us is something that exists in itself, as an unchanging reality, in itself.

It is argued that material or objective reality is a reality consciously perceived and interpreted by a person at a given moment in time. Therefore, human behavior must be viewed through the prism of his subjective perception and understanding of reality.

Accordingly, the emergence of addictive behavior is influenced by the subjective ability to comprehend reality.

Addictive behavior from the point of view of transactional analysis (E. Bern)

Transactional analysis (from the English transaction - deal) is a psychotherapeutic method developed by the American psychiatrist Eric Berne. Berne developed the concept of “psychological game”.

A game in transactional analysis is a form of behavior with an ulterior motive in which one of the subjects receives a psychological or other advantage. Addictive behavior, in his opinion, is also nothing more than a kind of psychological game. For example, “Drinking alcohol allows a person to manipulate the feelings and actions of others. At the same time, drinking alcohol is important not in itself, but as a process leading to a hangover.”

Forms of addictive behavior

When it comes to addictive behavior, most people think of alcoholics or people suffering from drug addiction, however, addictions have many forms. Some of them are socially unacceptable, while others, if not encouraged by society, are certainly not condemned:

• dependence on chemical substances - alcohol, tobacco, drugs, etc.;
• psychological dependence and codependency on another person;
• food addiction;
• addiction to telephone, computer, Internet addiction;
• gaming addiction;
• workaholism;
• shopaholism;
• addiction to adrenaline and so on.

Therapy for addicted clients

In psychotherapy for addicted clients, we gradually immerse ourselves in an awareness of childhood experiences through the experience of stopped feelings of anxiety, resentment, melancholy and loneliness next to the therapist. The therapist in this case plays the role of a “good caring mother”, providing the client with the experience of setting, holding and containing in those forms that are possible in the client-therapeutic relationship.

In psychotherapy for addictive behavior, the client learns to maintain distance in relationships, withstand anxiety in the “pre-contact zone,” relying on himself and his autonomy, without being afraid of rejection and the subsequent feeling of “abandonment,” loneliness and helplessness.

The goal of therapy is to form and appropriate the image of a “good mother” for oneself and gradually undergo psychological separation from the symbolic mother-therapist, acquiring the qualities of one’s internal holistic identity and the experience of relying on it.

Source

Causes of addictive behavior

Addictive behavior is a way to escape reality. All people strive to experience pleasure and avoid pain.

Dependence and addictive behavior

Usually, pleasure comes from achieving goals, building harmonious open relationships with others, implementing creative plans, professional success, creating a strong family, satisfaction with one’s life, having and raising children, pursuing hobbies, and various hobbies.

But if this is not the case in a person’s life, if he feels unfulfilled, sees life in gray colors, he may develop various addictions. Any form of addictive behavior brings pleasure to a person. Unfortunately, this pleasure cannot change the overall dissatisfaction with one's life, and ends the moment a person puts down the phone, or gets sober, or refuses to eat.

Therefore, in order to return the feeling of imaginary “happiness,” a person again returns to what brings him pleasure, not ready to look within himself for the strength to change his life.

Another reason for addiction is a way to avoid suffering. When a person has an internal conflict, negative emotions, depression, increased anxiety, it is easier for him to “plunge” into his addiction than to face the truth, come to terms with internal pain and try to overcome it.

In any case, addiction is a way to avoid responsibility for your life, for making decisions, for changes.

Factors that increase the risk of addiction:

• genetic – the tendency to addictive behavior is inherited due to the tolerance of neurotransmitter systems to various substances;
• social - children who grew up in dysfunctional families, or in an unfavorable environment, or if someone in the family suffered from addiction;
• the presence of psychopathic tendencies or character accentuations;
• low self-esteem, inferiority complex, dependence on the opinions of others, inability to realize one’s own “I”, separate from parents, etc.

These are conditions that can trigger the development of addiction to something, but much depends on the individual herself, her lifestyle, the decisions she makes and her life values.

Tendency to various addictions in a modern family 1982

Formulation of the problem

The spread of various types of addictive behavior (drug addiction, alcoholism, substance abuse, gambling addiction, Internet addiction, etc.) poses a serious threat to modern society and requires the combined efforts of specialists in various fields. A deep understanding of the causes, mechanisms and factors of addiction implies paying attention to both the personal characteristics of addicts and external ones, in particular to the socio-psychological conditions for the development of a tendency to addictive behavior. The last aspect implies a serious study of the immediate environment of dependent persons, and first of all we are talking about the family.

It is in the family that the primary socialization of the child occurs, his adaptation to changing life circumstances, the formation of certain cognitive schemes and patterns of behavior that allow him to more or less adequately perceive and solve certain problems. Most deviations in the behavior of dependent individuals have a single basis - an incorrect system of family education, which causes personal immaturity, social maladjustment of the child, a large number of intrapersonal problems and a limited set of ways to resolve them. For such a person, addictive activity is one of the easiest and most attractive paths of development.

Addictive behavior provides a person with the simplest opportunity to escape from solving pressing problems, a way of imaginary deliverance from crisis experiences; it is the most tempting way to escape from oneself, to avoid the complex process of personal formation and development. The basis of addiction, from the point of view of Ts. P. Korolenko, is the desire to escape from reality by achieving an altered state of consciousness through the use of psychoactive substances or constant fixation of attention on certain types of activities in order to develop and maintain intense emotions [1].

Many researchers see the psychological roots of addiction in the family, in the disruption of normal interaction between parents and children, and this applies to both chemical and non-chemical addictions. In particular, when studying drug addiction, psychologists believe that the family can act as a factor in 1) the formation of a pre-drug situation, 2) the fixation of psychological dependence on drugs, 3) the continuation of drug use, 4) the effectiveness of therapeutic and rehabilitation work [7].

Moreover, it is drug addiction (in comparison with alcohol, substance abuse, etc.) that is considered by scientists as a family addictive pattern, that is, a phenomenon that develops specifically in the family and is typical for the entire family situation [6]. In other words, the very family atmosphere of a potential and actual drug addict is addictogenic; in such a family, its other members also exhibit personality changes associated with a tendency to addiction. Thus, studies of families in which one of the members was diagnosed with drug addiction showed that addictive forms of behavior are inherent not only in the drug addict, but also in one of the parents (usually the father). Addictive behavior in a relative of a drug addict manifested itself in the form of: workaholism (38.7% of cases), overvalued hobbies, in particular, “health paranoia” (22.6% of cases), alcohol addiction (16.1% of cases), gambling (dependence on gambling) (12.9% of cases), religious fanaticism (9.7% of cases) [5].

Thus, the system of family relationships itself is a powerful source of the development of personal characteristics in a child, which form the psychological need for drug addiction, alcoholism, etc.

Study characteristics

Our research was based on the views regarding dependent behavior of V.D. Mendelevich, R. Bornstein, family psychology and family education of E.G. Eidemiller.

Let us turn to the results of a study aimed at identifying those pathologizing family characteristics that contribute to the development of a psychological tendency to dependent behavior.

The purpose
of the study
was to determine differences in interpersonal and chemical dependencies in two-parent and single-parent families and in families with different parenting styles.

Hypothesis

The study suggested that rates of chemical and interpersonal dependency are higher: 1) in single-parent families than in complete families, 2) in families with parental hyper- and hypoprotection than in families with a pleasant parenting style.

Sample characteristics

. The study was devoted to the study of the psychological propensity to drug and alcohol addiction and the severity of interpersonal dependence in young people brought up in two-parent and single-parent families and left without parental care. The study involved 155 high school students in Voronezh (77 boys and 78 girls) aged 16-17 years, among them 42 people from intact families, 40 people raised without a father, 38 people without a mother, 35 people left without parental care, as well as 110 students of Voronezh State University (56 girls and 54 boys) from intact families aged 17-19 years. The total number of respondents is 265 people.

The following diagnostic tools were used:

1) “relationship profile test” by R. Bornstein (adapted by O. P. Makushina), aimed at identifying three parameters:

a) destructive interpersonal dependence (manifested in the desire to receive help, support, protection from a significant person in the absence of a real need for this);

b) healthy dependence (i.e. the ability to establish long-term emotional relationships);

c) destructive separation (avoidance of long-term interpersonal relationships, a person’s inability to establish close attachment relationships) [3; eleven];

2) the questionnaire “Tendency to dependent behavior” by V. D. Mendelevich, which allows diagnosing psycholomania and alcoholism [5];

3) questionnaire “Analysis of family anxiety” (AST) by E. G. Eidemiller, V. V. Yustitskis [2]. The purpose of the “Analysis of Family Anxiety” technique is to study the general background of an individual’s experiences associated with his position in the family, how he perceives himself in the family. Family anxiety refers to states of anxiety and uncertainty caused by the family situation, which are often poorly understood and difficult to localize. Important components of family anxiety are also feelings of helplessness and inability to intervene in the course of events in the family, to direct it in the right direction. An individual with family-related anxiety does not feel like a significant actor in the family, regardless of what position he occupies in it and how active a role he actually plays. Along with the general indicator of family anxiety, the ACT questionnaire allows us to identify more specific indicators of family dysfunction: family guilt, anxiety and tension. Family guilt of a family member is an individual’s inadequate feeling of responsibility for everything negative that happens in the family. Family anxiety is a feeling that the situation in the family does not depend on a person’s own efforts. Family tension reflects the feeling that fulfilling family responsibilities is an overwhelming task for the individual;

4) questionnaire “Family parenting style” (FAS - “mirror”) by E. G. Eidemiller, V. V. Yustitskis [10]. The technique allows us to identify such characteristics of the educational process as the level of protection of the child, the completeness of satisfaction of his needs, the presence of requirements for the child, the degree of severity of prohibitions and sanctions (punishments), as well as a general indicator of the instability of the parenting style

Data processing was carried out using mathematical statistics methods. For computer processing of the results, the statistical package “Statistics” (“STATISTICA 6.0”) was used.

Research results

The average values ​​of dependence indicators according to the questionnaires of V. D. Mendelevich and R. Bornstein are presented in table. 1 and 2. To establish the significance of differences between the average values, the parametric Student's test was used.

Statistical processing of the data obtained allows us to say that there are significant differences in the severity of the parameters of interpersonal and chemical dependencies. As can be seen from table. 1 and 2, high school students without parents differ from young people from intact families in significantly higher rates of both chemical (especially alcohol (p < 0.001)) and interpersonal dependence (p < < 0.01), with the exception of the healthy parameter dependence, for which no significant differences were established.

In the group of subjects from single-parent families of the “maternal” type

Table 1

Average values ​​of indicators of interpersonal dependence in groups of subjects (n = 155)

table 2

Average values ​​of chemical dependence indicators in groups of subjects ( n

= 155)

(in which the father is absent) significantly higher rates of propensity to chemical dependence were found - drug addiction (p < 0.001) and alcoholism (p < 0.01).

The group of subjects from single-parent families of the “paternal” type (in which the mother is absent) is characterized by significantly lower rates of destructive and healthy dependence, tendency to drug addiction and alcoholism (p < < 0.001) and a significantly higher level of destructive separation (p < < 0 .01) in comparison with subjects from intact families.

Thus, living without parents creates a very powerful basis for the development of various types of addiction - both interpersonal and chemical. Apparently, a total disruption of the family structure, the absence of both mother and father, fundamentally distorts the development of the child’s personality, disrupts the natural mechanisms for the formation of healthy dependence, resulting in an overly expressed need for dependent relationships both with people and with psychoactive substances. Moreover, these relationships of dependence simultaneously actualize the destructive desire to separate from other people, which indicates the conflicting nature of interpersonal dependence in such young men - equally strong parallel desires both to get closer to people and to move away from them. This internal conflict will most likely push such a person towards choosing a chemical drug as a substitute for parental figures, therefore, from our point of view, a young person who lost his parents early is subject to an increased “risk factor” for the development of chemical dependence.

Growing up in a single-parent family without a father is the most important basis for the development of drug addiction. It can be assumed that the teenager is trying to find a replacement for the father figure with the drug (the drug is the most powerful object of addiction, causing consistently strong changes in sensations, and strength and stability are manifestations that are often associated with the father figure).

Growing up in a family without a mother creates a very interesting picture, which at first glance is relatively harmless - the indicators of all types of addictions in the subjects of this group are reduced. However, attention is drawn to the fact that the level of destructive separation is excessively high - apparently, raising a child in a family without a mother does not so much cause him the need for substitute dependent relationships, but rather creates problems in the development of interpersonal relationships in general. It can be assumed that the child’s lack of opportunity to communicate with his mother severely blocks a person’s natural need for communication and unnaturally strengthens the desire for destructive separation.

Thus, raising a child without the participation of parents in an incomplete family is extremely unfavorable from the point of view of the likelihood of his developing a psychological tendency to dependent behavior. These categories of adolescents and young people require the closest attention of psychologists, because timely work with a dependent person is of enormous preventive importance and helps prevent a person from choosing to develop addictive behavior.

However, we must not forget that a complete family is not always prosperous, and in a complete family there may be such features of relationships with parents that can act as, for example, drug-related factors. Next, we will talk about the results of our study aimed at studying the psychological tendency to drug addiction among students living in families with different characteristics of family relationships, with different types of parental education.

The correlation analysis shows that psychological propensity to drug addiction is positively related to the experience of guilt in the family (r = 0.41; p < 0.01), family anxiety (r = 0.42; p < 0.01) and such characteristics family education as hyperprotection (r = 0.48; p < 0.01), dissatisfaction of the child’s needs (r = 0.49; p < 0.01), bringing the conflict between parents into the sphere of child upbringing (r = 0.37 ; p < 0.05).

So, potential drug addiction is associated with unfavorable signs of the family situation: the development of a predisposition to drug addiction is characterized by contradictory, conflictual upbringing: on the one hand, hyperprotection dominates, and on the other, dissatisfaction of the child’s needs, and the conflictual relationships themselves between parents are brought into the sphere of relationships with baby. This situation may lead to the child developing hyper-responsibility for what is happening in the family, and the inability to cope with responsibility causes a feeling of guilt, which results in drug addiction.

In order to study in more detail the family relationships that shape the tendency to drug addiction, we set the task of identifying certain types of family education based on a stable combination of certain features of the parental relationship (the degree of hyperprotection, meeting the child’s needs, demands, prohibitions, sanctions), and subsequently identifying differences in the degree of predisposition to drug addiction of persons raised in families with certain types of upbringing. In accordance with this, the data of the subjects were subjected to a cluster analysis procedure in order to identify groups of subjects with similar parameters of family relationships that make up the types of their upbringing in the family. We used the tree clustering method with Ward's method and the quadratic Euclidean distance.

The conducted statistical multivariate analysis made it possible to identify four clusters, or four groups of subjects, characterized by similar features of family upbringing.

1st cluster

consisted of subjects who differed in the following characteristics: average level of parental protection; average level of satisfaction of the child's needs; average level of requirements and prohibitions; low rate of punishment. These characteristics make it possible to designate this type of upbringing as favorable for the optimal development of the child. This group consisted of 27 people (24.5% of the sample).

To the 2nd cluster

included subjects from families with the following upbringing traits: hypoprotection, i.e. insufficient attention to the child; the level of satisfaction of the child’s needs is below average; high level of requirements and prohibitions; severity of sanctions. The parents of the subjects included in this cluster resort to a parenting style of the type of emotional rejection of the child, when the entire parental attitude is manifested only in strict control of the child, but at the same time there is practically no trusting relationship with him. This group included 16 people (14.5% of the sample).

3rd cluster

are formed by subjects whose parents are characterized by the following manifestations of family upbringing: hypoprotection (virtually no attention to the child); ignoring the child's needs; minimum number of requirements for the child; absence of prohibitions and sanctions. These characteristics constitute a variant of upbringing according to the type of hypoprotection, when the child is left to his own devices, the parents are not interested in him and do not control him. This cluster consisted of 28 people (25.5% of the sample).

4th cluster

consisted of subjects with the following characteristics of parental attitudes: hyperprotection, i.e. parents paying excessive attention to the child; catering to the child's needs; low level of requirements and prohibitions; no sanctions. This type of upbringing can be described as pandering hyperprotection. This group consisted of 39 people (35.5% of the sample).

Initially, it is worth paying attention to information about the level of propensity for drug addiction, obtained according to the method of V. D. Mendelevich “Propensity for addictive behavior”, among subjects from each cluster. Statistical testing of the significance of differences between average indicators was carried out using Student's t-test. The average values ​​are given in table. 3.

As can be seen from table. 3, the highest rates of susceptibility to chemical dependence (drug addiction and alcoholism) are found in individuals

Table 3

Average values ​​of dependency indicators in groups of subjects with different types of upbringing ( n

= 110)

Note: x

— average values;
σ—standard deviations; * p
< 0.05;
** p
< 0.01.

brought up in families of the type of hypoprotection and indulgent hyperprotection. It is these indicators that are the highest indicators of propensity to x

chemical addiction (drug addiction and alcoholism) are found in individuals raised in families of the type of hypoprotection and indulgent hyperprotection. It is these indicators that significantly differ from the parameters of the tendency to corresponding addictions in families with a favorable parenting style (p < 0.01), on the basis of which we can confidently say that for the development of a psychological predisposition to drug addiction, upbringing with manifestations of both excessive parental attention is of fundamental importance , and frankly insufficient.

The discussion of the results

A family in which the parents adhere to a hypoprotective parenting style provides the child with complete freedom - the parents do not limit or control him in anything, he is left to his own devices. Such a situation in the family is not positive, since complete freedom and lack of control imply the child’s loneliness, lack of care and attention to him from his parents, lack of close, trusting relationships with them; The lack of restrictions, demands and responsibilities of the child in the family creates a feeling of one’s own uncertainty, insecurity, and instability.

And many psychologists belonging to various psychological directions spoke about the importance of satisfying the needs for security and intimacy. Thus, A. Maslow puts the need for security in second (in terms of the degree of need for satisfaction) position after the physical needs of the body (for food, warmth, etc.), and the need for love and intimacy - in third [4]. According to E. Fromm, human behavior is determined by two basic needs - individualization (the desire for freedom) and rooting (the desire for society), between which he tries to find a balance [9].

A family in which a child is left to his own devices does not give him the opportunity to feel protected and stable, and does not contribute to the realization of a person’s desire for close emotional connections. This may be why the indicators of interpersonal dependence of individuals in this group are low. Growing up in such a family, a person is forced to take the search for satisfaction of significant needs beyond its borders and find in other spheres of life situations characterized by special closeness, unity, indivisibility with any object, relations with which are characterized by maximum predictability, repeatability, reproducibility, which creates the feeling own security.

In an extraordinary form, these characteristics are present in the system of “person-drug” relations: addiction, especially chemical (in which both psychological and physical dependence develops, which consists in the impossibility of a person’s existence separately from the psychoactive substance both on the spiritual level and on the level of the body itself ), implies the maximum degree of fusion of oneself with a drug or alcohol. In this case, the psychoactive substance can be considered as an object that replaces close people with whom a person would really like to establish close and trusting relationships. In addition, drug addiction allows you to satisfy the unrealized need for predictability and stability: relationships with drugs or alcohol are always the same (in terms of the nature of their effect on the body), unlike interactions with real people, they are stable, reproducible (all that remains is to stock up on “ dose,” but the potential addict prefers not to think about this).

Let us turn to a family in which the parents raise the child with maximum attention, care, support, where there are no punishments or restrictions on the child, where he is the center of the family and the meaning of the parents’ life (the parenting style is “indulgent hyperprotection”). At first glance, the situation is quite positive - the child is surrounded by the care of his parents. Why, under such conditions, does a psychological need often develop for all the types of addiction we study?

Firstly, if parents strive to fulfill every whim of a child, to blindly satisfy all his desires, this is often due to the fact that they tend to see him as weak, small, incapable of independence (regardless of his age), thereby preventing him from making his first taking independent steps and depriving them of the opportunity to grow up. Thus, psychologically he is truly weak and dependent and continues to remain a child. It is appropriate to remember that psychological research data prove that one of the striking personality traits of an addicted person is his infantilism: the addict demonstrates forms of behavior, thinking and emotional response typical of a child who is not psychologically separated from his parents [7]. Against this background, an addictive relationship with an object, in particular with another person or a chemical drug, seems very logical - the drug is perceived as a powerful substance that can improve mood, change well-being, relieve anxiety, transport you to the world of fantasies and dreams, and other people are perceived as capable of protecting and protecting from problems.

If a child in the family was constantly pampered and tried to protect him from worries and pain, without giving him the opportunity to cope with difficulties on his own (even if this required more time and effort from him), he, as a rule, does not develop the experience of patience and overcoming suffering. A personality develops that cannot tolerate its own difficulties and is focused on achieving quick, even instant relief. For such a person, drugs or alcohol are the most suitable means of quickly and easily disconnecting from problems.

In such a family, the child does not develop the ability to make decisions independently; pliability to group influence, suggestibility, readiness for obedience, subordination, a focus on removing responsibility for one’s behavior and transferring responsibility for one’s behavior to others, solving vital issues and planning one’s own future are formed, i.e. ... precisely those traits that make up the “backbone” of a dependent personality.

Hyperprotection of parents also implies excessive attention paid to the child, which is why the latter is almost never alone, he is always “under the watchful eye” of family members who care about him. As a result, the child does not have the experience of loneliness; the usual situation for him is when he is with someone all the time and this “someone” belongs completely to him. An attitude toward relationships of fusion, symbiosis, and interdependence is formed, thereby developing a personality trait typical of an addict—the need for symbiotic relationships [8]. This trait is manifested in the fact that a dependent person does not have clear personal boundaries, he is unable to differentiate his thoughts and feelings from the thoughts and feelings of other people, he is insensitive to his own emotional experiences, and tends to take responsibility for others, while shifting the responsibility onto them. for myself.

And finally, let us remember once again that prohibitions and restrictions in the family (expressed to a reasonable extent, of course) serve as guidelines and set the boundaries of behavior, creating a sense of security and stability in the child. In the type of families we are considering, despite the fact that the child is an idol for his parents, he, just like in a family with hypoprotection, does not encounter any prohibitions, which increases his sense of uncertainty and insecurity. Therefore, in the future, the mechanism for developing a tendency to dependency will generally be almost the same as that of a child from the previous type of family.

In families with emotional rejection of the child, a high rate of interpersonal dependence was also revealed. A family in which a child is subjected to strict, total control, encounters rejection and a cold attitude towards himself, creates in him the need for especially close, trusting and even symbiotic relationships. Warmth, closeness and interdependence, which the child did not receive from his parents, become the object of his search in relationships with other people, which forms his needs for interpersonal dependence.

Conclusion

So, the family is one of the most important elements of the social environment in which the personality is formed and develops. Each of the family members, the system of relationships between them, the general family atmosphere directly and indirectly influence the process of personality formation, participate in the transformation of its relationships to itself, to people, to the world around it. Violations of intrafamily relationships create an unfavorable background for the emotional development of the child, which can become a source of personality disorders and behavioral disorders (including various types of dependent behavior).

Psychological optimization of family relationships undoubtedly contributes to the development of a healthy personality and the preservation of the psychological health of society as a whole.

Is it possible to cope with addiction?

The longer a person indulges his addiction, the more difficult it is for him to cope with it. At the initial stage, willpower and internal motivation may be enough for him, but in severe cases this becomes impossible without medication and psychological help.

However, this process is not quick and requires serious work on yourself. Medication alone will not help you cope with addiction, because when a person is discharged from the hospital, he returns to a life that does not satisfy him. Moreover, this life is devoid of the only meaning that he had in recent years, and perhaps most of his life - the object of his dependence.

At the level of psychological assistance, cognitive and behavioral therapy, gestaltherapy, working through psychological trauma, working with depression and fears are effective. A person needs to master new patterns of behavior, learn to predict and analyze situations that provoke the desire to return to addiction, and look for constructive ways to gain pleasure.

Dependency as a failure of separation

Margaret Mahler's theory of separation and individuation describes the development of a child up to 2 years of age. The condition for healthy development is separation from the mother and gaining reliance on one’s own individual qualities, knowledge, skills, abilities and results.

If a child is completely “saturated” with his mother in the first six months of his life, he develops a healthy intrapsychic image of his mother. It is thanks to this assigned image of a good mother that the child can safely gradually separate from her. At the same time, it feels good to be with yourself and do your own thing. It is the assigned intrapsychic image of a good mother for ourselves that allows us to feel confident and satisfy our needs in adulthood.

If a person does not have an image of his own “good caring mother” for himself, he will not be able to feel autonomous, fulfilled and confident in life, he will forever search for his “lost mother”.

In fact, dependent people were unable to undergo primary separation from their mother in early childhood. They did not have enough external manifestations of a real, caring, empathic mother to form and appropriate the image of a good internal parent for themselves.

Dependents are eternal “orphans”, looking for and never finding their “good mother”, suffering due to the inability to be independent and happy.

Prevention of addictive behavior

It is much easier to prevent addictive behavior from forming than to cope with it, which is why there is a whole range of measures aimed at preventing addictive behavior. These include:

• working with a psychologist to overcome internal conflicts and psychological trauma;
• improving the quality of life and achieving psychological comfort;
• expanding the range of interests and social connections;
• establishing intra-family relationships, including relationships with elderly parents;
• awareness of personal integrity and building adequate self-esteem;
• identifying life goals and steps to achieve them.

Addictive behavior is dangerous both for the person himself, since it has a destructive effect on his life, and for his loved ones, who, willy-nilly, are “drawn” into the fight against addiction, sometimes becoming codependent, which does not bring anything good either for them or for the person with additive behavior. Therefore, it is important to consciously approach this problem and prevent addiction from developing by taking measures to prevent and overcome it.

Violations of early relationships as a way of developing addiction

They can be divided into three groups - according to the types of basic needs that a child needs in the first year of life. If the child’s needs are not systematically met, the child develops that basic anxiety, which will subsequently push him to smoke, drink alcohol, take drugs, overeat, gambling addiction, work or shopaholism, “getting stuck” in relationships, etc.

So, the basic needs of a child in the first year of life and violations in their satisfaction:

1. Setting . It is important for the child that the mother’s breast “appears” systematically and regularly. It is the regular, timely appearance of the breast, as a nourishing and most important object for the baby’s life, that gives him a feeling of calm. That is, it forms the experience that “the environment responds to my needs and I am calm about this.” If the setting of nutrition and “communication with the breast” is systematically violated - the mother feeds the baby at the wrong time, not as much as he needs (underfeeds or overfeeds), that is, she is not sensitive to the child’s personal rhythms, he begins to experience constant anxiety for his survival. That is, he is not sure that when he needs it, food will definitely appear again, in the quantity and volume necessary for saturation and calm.

2. Holding . The child needs to be “held in his arms,” a feeling of comfortable physical interaction with his mother, through which he will feel safety and goodwill. If the child was not picked up enough, the necessary holding was not provided, the mother’s attitude towards the child was unkind - that is, the child could not calm down in the mother’s arms (anxious, irritable, depressed mother), could not grasp her goodwill and love, this would cause anxiety and disrupt basic trust in the world. “The world is hostile to me,” “the world does not love me.”

3. Containing . The child needs containment, that is, to accommodate, withstand, and absorb his emotional, bodily, and behavioral reactions by the mother. If the mother tolerates the child with his manifestations, he develops the experience of accepting him with different reactions, that he can be and exist with them, remaining in a relationship and receiving the necessary nutrition, touch, and friendly communication. If the mother was often irritated by the child’s reactions - that he was sick, pooped, burped, screamed or cried a lot, etc., tried to somehow forcibly force the child not to manifest himself (did not accept him like that), then the baby develops the experience of experiencing - “ I cannot be accepted with my natural manifestations.”

The less the child’s needs were met in the first year of life, the more dependent behavior will be manifested in such an adult.

Signs

What are the basic psychological characteristics of addictive behavior? Signs of addictive behavior are as follows:

• psychological instability of the individual;
• superficial perception of reality;
• formal performance of roles imposed by society;
• weak adaptive potential of the individual;
• replacement of life values ​​with invented reality;
• psychological discomfort;
• guilt;
• increased personal and situational anxiety;
• despair and low self-esteem;
• high self-esteem, bordering on self-confidence and a sense of superiority;
• deceit, secrecy, isolation;
• aggressiveness;
• tendency to blame other people for your failures;
• manipulation of relatives and friends;
• fear of being emotionally attached to someone;
• loss of previous friendships;
• the emergence of relationships with people who have the same type of addiction;
• stereotypical behavior and stereotyped thinking;
• avoidance of taking responsibility;
• infantilism;
• avoidance of problem solving;

Determining the onset of addictive behavior can be complicated by the fact that its signs and symptoms are individual and have varying degrees of severity. In addition, it is easy to confuse the signs of addictive behavior with its causes.

My recommendations

My work experience shows that the main difficulty in treating addiction is the patient’s refusal to admit his problem. Here I rely not only on the diagnostic results, but also on the help of the client’s relatives. If through joint efforts it is possible to bring a person to admit the harmfulness of his habit, then I enter into a contract with him.

During classes, addicts systematically move towards a healthy lifestyle:

- list the reasons why they should get rid of the addiction; - describe their life regardless of dependence, make a collage “Past – Present – ​​Future”.

Despite all the efforts of psychologists, psychotherapists and psychiatrists, it is very difficult to overcome addiction. According to statistics, only 20% of addicts return to normal life after rehabilitation measures.

Diagnostics

There are special psychological tests that can reveal a person’s tendency towards addictive behavior: this is evidenced by certain character traits. These include:

• the need to stand out from the crowd with bright clothing accessories, an extraordinary image, and defiant actions;
• gambling and risk taking;
• mental instability;
• tendency to loneliness and solitude;
• pessimism;
• poor development of the emotional-volitional sphere.

However, the presence of a tendency to addiction does not guarantee the development of one or another type of addiction. Negative character traits only create the preconditions for addiction. It will be formed only if a person finds himself in unfavorable social conditions.

Psychiatrists diagnose the presence of addictions in an individual through a special conversation and by assessing the patient’s appearance. Signs of addiction are found in the patient’s speech and his reactions to the doctor.

Diagnosis of chemical dependencies is the competence of a narcologist. It is detected through tests.