Relational dynamics of families with drug abusing adolescents: A qualitative analysis of conversations

This study is a part of a larger study with families of adolescent drug abusers (Lewis et al., 1989; 1990; Piercy et al., 1991; Volk et al., 1989). A number of 88 family conversations were qualitatively examined. Self-reported data from the larger study and observational data from the conversations were included in the analyses. Two broad categories of family functioning were generated from a holistic observation. Negative family functioning tends to be related with hard drug users. Four major themes of conversations were identified through analysis of turn-taking in the conversations and categorized as (1) autonomy, (2) closeness, (3) family collapse, (4) other. A series of Oneway ANOVAs were performed to check consistency between the qualitative categories with the quantitative coding and to examine mean differences among the four categories. The analysis found reasonable consistency and mean differences, despite some non-significant results, were in the expected direction with regard to Family Cohesion, Father Cohesion, Mother Cohesion, IP Cohesion, IP\u27s reported Open Communication with Father and Mother, and IP\u27s Index of Drug Severity Scores. Theoretical, methodological and clinical implications were discussed