Alcohol use disorder was defined conditionally, such that (a) lifetime DSM-IV alcohol abuse and dependence items were combined into an 11-item symptom count for respondents who endorsed having ever used alcohol, and (b) abstainers were coded as missing. The variable was skewed and kurtotic and was log-transformed to approximate normality (after transformation: skewness=0.56, kurtosis=−0.77). The number of symptoms ranged from 0 to 10 in men (M=1.99, SD=2.15) and women (M=1.07, SD=1.55) and the average number of symptoms in the sample was 1.44 (SD=1.87). Lifetime prevalence of alcohol abuse among men, women, and the sample was 40.0%, 18.6%, and 27.2%, respectively. Lifetime prevalence of alcohol dependence among men, women, and the sample was 16.2%, 7.5%, and 11.0%, respectively. The symptom count demonstrated acceptable internal consistency (Cronbach’s α=0.77) and the test-retest reliability (r(161)=.64) was lower than for the ND and CUD symptom counts. The correlations with birth year (r=.09) and assessment year (r=.07) were low.
