Alcohol Use Affects Divorce Rates

 Posted on February 14, 2013 in Divorce

A man who drinks heavily can make a great husband, but not so for a wife, according to a new Norwegian study cited in an Australian online newspaper. The results of the study were published in early February in the online edition of the journal Alcoholism: Clinical & Experimental Research and included data collected from almost 20,000 couples. The results showed that, according to news.com.au that "divorce was more common in couples with high rates of alcohol consumption—particularly if the wife was the heavy drinker."

In couples where both parties were heavy drinkers the divorce rate hovered at about 17.2 percent. According to the U.S. Census Bureau Statistical Abstract, the divorce rate in the U.S. in 2009 was 3.4 per 1,000 people, down from 4.7 in 1990 and 4.1 in 2000. All these figures are significantly lower than the figures found in the Norwegian study that considers alcohol consumption.

"Where the wife was the heavy drinker," according to the Australian news source, "the divorce rate soared to 26.8 percent, compared to 13.1 percent where the man was consuming more alcohol." These figures are significantly higher than couples in the study which reported being only light drinkers, and which were found to divorce a mere 5.8 percent of the time. While there's no conclusive sociological study that examines why these results are so, Fartein Ask Torvik, a researcher at the Norwegian Institute of Public Health, said they were likely due to two reasons: one, that women are affected more strongly by alcohol than men; and two, that drinking "may be judged as incompatible with female roles."

Whether or not alcohol is a factor in divorce, divorce is never an easy process. Don't go through it alone. Contact a dedicated Chicago-area divorce attorney today.

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