Study Finds Five Types of Alcoholics

No one is immune from the effects of excessive drinking. It doesn't matter how old you are, male or female, your ethnicity, or your family background. Alcoholism can affect anyone.

(WebMD) New alcoholism research identifies five types of alcoholics and shows that young adults account for more than half of U.S. alcoholics.

The high percentage of young adults among alcoholics was unexpected, notes researcher Howard Moss, M.D., the associate director for clinical and translational research at the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism (NIAAA).

"While we knew that many young adults had problematic involvement with alcohol from our research on college-aged drinkers, we were certainly surprised by the proportion of alcohol-dependent individuals who fell into that young adult cluster," Moss tells WebMD.

In the journal Drug and Alcohol Dependence, Moss and colleagues describe the five types of alcoholics. But before you read those descriptions, keep Moss' advice in mind.

"We hope that if someone suspects they may have a problem with alcohol that they talk about this with their health care provider," Moss tells WebMD. "If the health care professional is uncomfortable with assessing alcohol problems (and we hope all such professionals are comfortable with these assessments) the individual should ask for a referral to an addictions specialist for an in-depth evaluation," he says.