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[Biomedicalization of Alcohol Studies] is an important record of the recent trend toward over-emphasizing biomedical approaches to alcohol.[Midanik] establishes the importance for science and for the public's health of balanced interdisciplinary research from molecules to macro-social conditions. -Alexander C. Wagenaar, professor, Department of Epidemiology and Health Policy Research and Institute for Child Health Policy, University of Florida, College of Medicine <br> Dr. Midanik gives us here a lucid and fair-minded exploration of the ideologies which shape today's alcohol research in Biomedicalization of Alcohol Studies. It deserves to be read by absolutely everyone engaged in such work, whatever their parent discipline, and also by all those authorities who make the funding decisions. <br> -- Griffith Edwards, National Addiction Centre and editor, Addiction <br> This book shows that alcohol problems are too complex and too important to be conceptualized within a narrow biomedical framework. It makes a compelling case for the need to complement individual-level biological research with population-level social and epidemiological investigations. <br> The Biomedicalization of Alcohol Studies will be essential reading for addiction scientists, policymakers and historians of science. To ignore its argument for a more balanced research agenda is needed is to limit the considerable potential of public health approaches to address the global burden of disease attributable to alcohol. <br> This book is above all a treatise on the risks to public health of reductionism, geneticism and medicalization of alcohol studies. The search for biomedical solutions for complex societal problems is analogous to the proverbial drunk looking for his lost car keys under the first available lamppost. We shape our research agenda, and thereafter our agenda shapes the evidence base for our policy options. -Dr. Thomas Babor, University of Connecticut Sc

-[Biomedicalization of Alcohol Studies] is an important record of the recent trend toward over-emphasizing biomedical approaches to alcohol.[Midanik] establishes the importance for science and for the public's health of balanced interdisciplinary research from molecules to macro-social conditions.- --Alexander C. Wagenaar, professor, Department of Epidemiology and Health Policy Research and Institute for Child Health Policy, University of Florida, College of Medicine -Dr. Midanik gives us here a lucid and fair-minded exploration of the ideologies which shape today's alcohol research in Biomedicalization of Alcohol Studies. It deserves to be read by absolutely everyone engaged in such work, whatever their parent discipline, and also by all those authorities who make the funding decisions.- --Griffith Edwards, National Addiction Centre and editor, Addiction -This book shows that alcohol problems are too complex and too important to be conceptualized within a narrow biomedical framework. It makes a compelling case for the need to complement individual-level biological research with population-level social and epidemiological investigations. The Biomedicalization of Alcohol Studies will be essential reading for addiction scientists, policymakers and historians of science. To ignore its argument for a more balanced research agenda is needed is to limit the considerable potential of public health approaches to address the global burden of disease attributable to alcohol. This book is above all a treatise on the risks to public health of reductionism, geneticism and medicalization of alcohol studies. The search for biomedical solutions for complex societal problems is analogous to the proverbial drunk looking for his lost car keys under the first available lamppost. We shape our research agenda, and thereafter our agenda shapes the evidence base for our policy options. - --Dr. Thomas Babor, University of Connecticut School of Medicine -College-level health will welcome Biomedicalization of Alcohol Studies: Ideological Shifts and Institutional Challenges. It covers the science and assumptions of risk assessment and treatment, covering the controversial issues surrounding the biomedicalization of alcohol studies and describing, critiquing and assessing its influence as a social trend in the health field....dedicated health and psychology collections will find it just the ticket, covering in detail a most controversial new discipline.- --The Midwest Book Review -Lorraine Midanik provides a timely critique of biomedicalization: the unreflective and uncritical use of the 'brain disease' model in the field of alcohol studies. She spells out her converns about its consequences: namely, that an emphasis on the individual biological and genetic determinants of 'alcoholism' will distract us from attending to the social consequences of alcohol use and undermine population-level strategies for reducing alcohol-related harm...It should prompt more social research on this trend and its policy consequences- --Wayne Hall, Addiction 2007 -To get the balance that is wanted in alcohol study, Midanik recommends that more attention be paid to interdisciplinary research, to vested interests, and to getting the media to pay attention to social science finding. This work and the recommendations in it are eminently reasonable.... Midanik shows that general alcohol use, including dependency, costs the nation more than illegal drug use. In sum, this is a worthy argument,- --Harris Chaiklin, PhD, The Journal of Nervous and Mental Disease -From the first pages of Lorraine Midanik's thoughtful and thought provoking book, one senses a commitment to coming to terms with some of the major policy and practice and educational challenges of our times, having to do with the role of science, the role of government and the role of money in understanding addiction generally, and the social context and the social construction of socials problems, especially as they relate to alcohol studies. Underlying the thesis is a larger concern about the current of social science research, not only in alcohol studies, but more generally the health sciences.- --E. Michael Gorman, Journal of Sociology and Social Welfare [Biomedicalization of Alcohol Studies] is an important record of the recent trend toward over-emphasizing biomedical approaches to alcohol.[Midanik] establishes the importance for science and for the public's health of balanced interdisciplinary research from molecules to macro-social conditions. --Alexander C. Wagenaar, professor, Department of Epidemiology and Health Policy Research and Institute for Child Health Policy, University of Florida, College of Medicine Dr. Midanik gives us here a lucid and fair-minded exploration of the ideologies which shape today's alcohol research in Biomedicalization of Alcohol Studies. It deserves to be read by absolutely everyone engaged in such work, whatever their parent discipline, and also by all those authorities who make the funding decisions. --Griffith Edwards, National Addiction Centre and editor, Addiction This book shows that alcohol problems are too complex and too important to be conceptualized within a narrow biomedical framework. It makes a compelling case for the need to complement individual-level biological research with population-level social and epidemiological investigations. The Biomedicalization of Alcohol Studies will be essential reading for addiction scientists, policymakers and historians of science. To ignore its argument for a more balanced research agenda is needed is to limit the considerable potential of public health approaches to address the global burden of disease attributable to alcohol. This book is above all a treatise on the risks to public health of reductionism, geneticism and medicalization of alcohol studies. The search for biomedical solutions for complex societal problems is analogous to the proverbial drunk looking for his lost car keys under the first available lamppost. We shape our research agenda, and thereafter our agenda shapes the evidence base for our policy options. --Dr. Thomas Babor, University of Connecticut School of Medicine College-level health will welcome Biomedicalization of Alcohol Studies: Ideological Shifts and Institutional Challenges. It covers the science and assumptions of risk assessment and treatment, covering the controversial issues surrounding the biomedicalization of alcohol studies and describing, critiquing and assessing its influence as a social trend in the health field....dedicated health and psychology collections will find it just the ticket, covering in detail a most controversial new discipline. --The Midwest Book Review Lorraine Midanik provides a timely critique of biomedicalization: the unreflective and uncritical use of the 'brain disease' model in the field of alcohol studies. She spells out her converns about its consequences: namely, that an emphasis on the individual biological and genetic determinants of 'alcoholism' will distract us from attending to the social consequences of alcohol use and undermine population-level strategies for reducing alcohol-related harm...It should prompt more social research on this trend and its policy consequences --Wayne Hall, Addiction 2007 To get the balance that is wanted in alcohol study, Midanik recommends that more attention be paid to interdisciplinary research, to vested interests, and to getting the media to pay attention to social science finding. This work and the recommendations in it are eminently reasonable.... Midanik shows that general alcohol use, including dependency, costs the nation more than illegal drug use. In sum, this is a worthy argument, --Harris Chaiklin, PhD, The Journal of Nervous and Mental Disease From the first pages of Lorraine Midanik's thoughtful and thought provoking book, one senses a commitment to coming to terms with some of the major policy and practice and educational challenges of our times, having to do with the role of science, the role of government and the role of money in understanding addiction generally, and the social context and the social construction of socials problems, especially as they relate to alcohol studies. Underlying the thesis is a larger concern about the current of social science research, not only in alcohol studies, but more generally the health sciences. --E. Michael Gorman, Journal of Sociology and Social Welfare [Biomedicalization of Alcohol Studies] is an important record of the recent trend toward over-emphasizing biomedical approaches to alcohol.[Midanik] establishes the importance for science and for the public's health of balanced interdisciplinary research from molecules to macro-social conditions. -- Alexander C. Wagenaar, professor, Department of Epidemiology and Health Policy Research and Institute for Child Health Policy, University of Florida, College of Medicine Dr. Midanik gives us here a lucid and fair-minded exploration of the ideologies which shape today's alcohol research in Biomedicalization of Alcohol Studies. It deserves to be read by absolutely everyone engaged in such work, whatever their parent discipline, and also by all those authorities who make the funding decisions. --Griffith Edwards, National Addiction Centre and editor, Addiction This book shows that alcohol problems are too complex and too important to be conceptualized within a narrow biomedical framework. It makes a compelling case for the need to complement individual-level biological research with population-level social and epidemiological investigations. The Biomedicalization of Alcohol Studies will be essential reading for addiction scientists, policymakers and historians of science. To ignore its argument for a more balanced research agenda is needed is to limit the considerable potential of public health approaches to address the global burden of disease attributable to alcohol. This book is above all a treatise on the risks to public health of reductionism, geneticism and medicalization of alcohol studies. The search for biomedical solutions for complex societal problems is analogous to the proverbial drunk looking for his lost car keys under the first available lamppost. We shape our research agenda, and thereafter our agenda shapes the evidence base for our policy options. -- Dr. Thomas Babor, University of Connecticut School of Medicine College-level health will welcome Biomedicalization of Alcohol Studies: Ideological Shifts and Institutional Challenges. It covers the science and assumptions of risk assessment and treatment, covering the controversial issues surrounding the biomedicalization of alcohol studies and describing, critiquing and assessing its influence as a social trend in the health field....dedicated health and psychology collections will find it just the ticket, covering in detail a most controversial new discipline. --The Midwest Book Review Lorraine Midanik provides a timely critique of biomedicalization: the unreflective and uncritical use of the 'brain disease' model in the field of alcohol studies. She spells out her converns about its consequences: namely, that an emphasis on the individual biological and genetic determinants of 'alcoholism' will distract us from attending to the social consequences of alcohol use and undermine population-level strategies for reducing alcohol-related harm...It should prompt more social research on this trend and its policy consequences --Wayne Hall, Addiction 2007 To get the balance that is wanted in alcohol study, Midanik recommends that more attention be paid to interdisciplinary research, to vested interests, and to getting the media to pay attention to social science finding. This work and the recommendations in it are eminently reasonable.... Midanik shows that general alcohol use, including dependency, costs the nation more than illegal drug use. In sum, this is a worthy argument, --Harris Chaiklin, PhD, The Journal of Nervous and Mental Disease From the first pages of Lorraine Midanik's thoughtful and thought provoking book, one senses a commitment to coming to terms with some of the major policy and practice and educational challenges of our times, having to do with the role of science, the role of government and the role of money in understanding addiction generally, and the social context and the social construction of socials problems, especially as they relate to alcohol studies. Underlying the thesis is a larger concern about the current of social science research, not only in alcohol studies, but more generally the health sciences. --E. Michael Gorman, Journal of Sociology and Social Welfare [Biomedicalization of Alcohol Studies] is an important record of the recent trend toward over-emphasizing biomedical approaches to alcohol.[Midanik] establishes the importance for science and for the public's health of balanced interdisciplinary research from molecules to macro-social conditions. -Alexander C. Wagenaar, professor, Department of Epidemiology and Health Policy Research and Institute for Child Health Policy, University of Florida, College of Medicine Dr. Midanik gives us here a lucid and fair-minded exploration of the ideologies which shape today's alcohol research in Biomedicalization of Alcohol Studies. It deserves to be read by absolutely everyone engaged in such work, whatever their parent discipline, and also by all those authorities who make the funding decisions. -- Griffith Edwards, National Addiction Centre and editor, Addiction This book shows that alcohol problems are too complex and too important to be conceptualized within a narrow biomedical framework. It makes a compelling case for the need to complement individual-level biological research with population-level social and epidemiological investigations. The Biomedicalization of Alcohol Studies will be essential reading for addiction scientists, policymakers and historians of science. To ignore its argument for a more balanced research agenda is needed is to limit the considerable potential of public health approaches to address the global burden of disease attributable to alcohol. This book is above all a treatise on the risks to public health of reductionism, geneticism and medicalization of alcohol studies. The search for biomedical solutions for complex societal problems is analogous to the proverbial drunk looking for his lost car keys under the first available lamppost. We shape our research agenda, and thereafter our agenda shapes the evidence base for our policy options. -Dr. Thomas Babor, University of Connecticut Sc

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Lorraine Midanik is a professor in the School of Social Welfare, University of California, Berkeley.

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