Participants were recruited through the use of newspaper and radio advertisements, and through other programs at our university medical center. Callers were first evaluated on the telephone with a brief screening procedure and were either excluded (and referred elsewhere for treatment), or scheduled for an intake interview. The final decision about eligibility was made at the intake interview, after completion of the SCID-I/P (to determine presence of alcohol dependence and exclusionary diagnoses). Those who were eligible, and agreed to be randomly assigned to treatment, reviewed and signed an IRB-approved consent form and completed the intake assessment. All participants were asked to give the name of a collateral (usually a spouse or close friend) who would be able to verify his/her level of drinking and his/her location, and one-third of those were later contacted at follow-ups. Participants were assigned to treatment using an urn randomization procedure (Stout et al., 1994) that balanced the three groups for gender, age, ethnicity, alcohol dependence, and lifetime involvement with AA.
