EMOTIONS AND BIOCHEMICAL FINDINGS IN ALCOHOLISM

In a combined psychiatric-biochemical study of patients suffering from chronic alcoholism, emotions were determined by one investigator (O.D.) and biochemical studies were carried out simultaneously by the other (M.F.F.). In anxiety the biochemical substance is apparently nor-epinephrine, while in tension cholinergic substances are present. The substance found in the presence of resentment cannot be defined, but it is definitely not acetylcholine. It was found that the alcoholic patients had varying degrees of resentment when an urge to drink was present. Alcohol relieved the resentment and the corresponding substance in the blood disappeared. In a few patients, tension and correlated biochemical substances were also present and were affected by alcohol. Anxiety was somewhat decreased but not completely abolished.

There are no indications that the resentment in alcoholic patients is different from that presented by other subjects.