Elsevier

Research in Developmental Disabilities

Volume 30, Issue 5, September–October 2009, Pages 927-932
Research in Developmental Disabilities

Substance abuse, coping strategies, adaptive skills and behavioral and emotional problems in clients with mild to borderline intellectual disability admitted to a treatment facility: A pilot study

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ridd.2009.01.002Get rights and content

Abstract

Many clients with mild to borderline intellectual disability (ID) who are admitted to a treatment facility show serious problems in alcohol and/or drugs use. In the present case file study, we explored differences in coping strategies, adaptive skills and emotional and behavioral problems between clients who showed substance abuse and clients who did not. There were no differences in adaptive skills between groups. However, compared to clients without substance abuse, those who abused substances showed a more palliative coping style, and had more severe emotional and behavior problems such as anxiety/depression and intrusive thoughts and aggressive and antisocial behaviors. Implications for treatment are discussed.

Section snippets

Participants and setting

Participants were 39 clients with mild to borderline ID who were admitted to an inpatient specialized unit of a treatment facility between 1995 and 2005. They were admitted to the facility for treatment of their behavioral and/or emotional problems. Upon admission, 18 clients (i.e., 46%) showed substance abuse of whom four clients abused alcohol, seven clients showed abuse of drugs (e.g., cannabis), and seven clients abused both alcohol and drugs. Clients were allocated to the experimental

Results

Results from Mann–Whitney analyses revealed that there was no significant differences in UCL mean subscale scores between groups, except for ‘Palliative reaction’ (see Table 2). Clients with substance abuse showed a significantly higher level of palliative reaction than clients without substance abuse.

There were significant differences in severity of behavioral and emotional problems between clients who abused substances and those who did not (see Table 3). Compared to clients without substance

Discussion

Substance abuse was highly prevalent in clients with mild to moderate ID with severe behavioral and emotional problems who were admitted to a specialized treatment unit of a residential facility between 1995 and 2005. Of the sample of 39 clients, 46% abused alcohol and/or drugs. This percentage is in concordance with outcomes of a survey by Tenneij and Koot (2007a) among adults with severe behavior problems who were inpatients of one of the five Dutch treatment facilities. They found that 42%

Acknowledgement

We thank Dichterbij at Oostrum for participation.

References (16)

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