Subjects selected on the basis of their drinking histories (alcoholics, heavy drinkers, and social drinkers, N = 24) were tested on a series of tasks in order to assess organizational processes in memory. Each subject was tested twice: once while sober and once while intoxicated (blood alcohol level = 100 mg%). No systematic differences emerged as a function of drinking history, but results indicated that alcohol intoxication had several detrimental effects on memory performance. Intoxicated subjects recalled less information, had lower organizational scores, and learned at slower rates. Both storage and retrieval processes were adversely affected by alcohol, although retrieval processes were somewhat responsive to experimental manipulations. Findings are discussed in terms of the passive or unsystematic encoding strategies in intoxicated subjects that lowered the efficiency of their semantic organization and recall.

The Sensation-Seeking Scale and the State-Trait Anxiety Inventory were administered to 30 white, 30 black, and 30 Hispanic male narcotic drug abusers in residential treatment. Individual drug abuse histories were assessed in semistructured interviews. The results indicate that (a) white subjects scored significantly higher on the five Sensation-Seeking subscales than did either black or Hispanic subjects. No significant differences were obtained between ethnic groups on state or trait anxiety, (b) Even though the prevalence of the use of alcohol, cannabis, street methodone, and cocaine was similar in the three ethnic groups, significantly more white subjects had used amphetamines, barbiturates, tranquilizers, methaqualone, inhalants, and psychedelics. (c) Measures of sensation seeking and anxiety correlated significantly with the number of different drugs used by whites, although the measures were virtually unrelated to drug use among nonwhites. The frequency of use of stimulant, depressant, or hallucinogenic drugs was unrelated to the user's level of sensation seeking or anxiety. Among individuals with extensive histories of drug abuse, ethnicity appeared to be more closely related to drug-use patterns than motivational variables such as sensation seeking and anxiety.

In order lo measure manipulative tendencies among narcotics abusers, the Machiavellianism (Mach IV) Scale was administered to a sample of narcotics abusers in residential treatment. Obtained means and standard deviations were well within the range of values reported for non drug abusing samples. Examination ofthe retest reliability and validity ofthe present Mach IV scores confirmed the reliability ofthe scale. However, a three -person bargaining situationfailed to validate Mach Scale scores, possibly due to constraints imposed by the institutional setting andjor to the educational level ofthe sample.

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