by Maribeth Woods

Created on: November 16, 2008

The disease model of addiction was named by Jellinek who worked in research for AA. This model believes that people abuse alcohol and are addicted to the drug, due to a biologically caused condition. Researchers of this model say that there is a loss of control when using the drug, and that the addiction is a chronic and progressive disease. They also believe that addiction is an illness that is in need of treatment. Biological conditions may be one source of why addiction occurs, but I somewhat disagree with this model, because one model can not explain why addiction occurs. The reason I somewhat disagree with this model is that addiction is based upon several other contributing factors as well. I believe that people who are born to heavy drug and alcohol users are born with a gene that makes them more likely to become addicted than if they were born to a parent who did not pass that heavy alcohol and drug using gene to them. Yet, I have a friend who has an alcoholic father and mother, so therefore alcohol addiction runs through her blood, yet she chooses not to drink and to fight her biological instinct. This is one example that shows addiction cannot be solely based on the disease model. Addiction can be contributed to several factors such as environment, parental involvement, social life, etc. Another example that makes me disagree with this model, is that a person can become addicted because they use it to cope with every day life and use it to de-stress. Instead of playing sports, reading, listening to music, trying a new hobby, etc. they choose to use a drug instead; which does not coincide with the disease model, because this example is not related to a biological condition. The reason I somewhat disagree with the disease model of addiction, is because there are several other contributing factors that lead too and in a sense are the cause of addiction. The disease model states that the addiction is because of a biologically caused condition, yet this cannot fully explain why an addiction occurs. In reality, there are many reasons why a person may become addicted; such as where the person resides, whether their family are users, economic situations, their social life, etc. I believe biological conditions may play an important factor towards why a person becomes addicted, yet I disagree because there are several other factors and biological reasons can not be the only one.

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