“Alcohol is involved in half of all murders, rapes, and assaults,” said Robert O. Pihl, professor of psychology and psychiatry at McGill University. “But the dynamics of this association are complicated, which is why any research that focuses on explaining this relationship is important for society in general.” John C. Umhau, MD, MPH, CPE is board-certified in addiction medicine and preventative medicine. For over 20 years Dr. Umhau was a senior clinical investigator at the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism of the National Institutes of Health (NIH).
Relationship between Alcohol and Anger
- If a health professional has diagnosed you with anger management problems, you may find these get worse when you drink.
- There’s less filtering happening between brain and mouth, less consideration for consequences.
For those who are suffering from alcoholism and anger psychotherapy might be the best option. This type of therapy focuses on learning how a person’s anger and alcoholism started and reprograms the brain so it no longer thinks that it needs alcohol to deal with anger and other emotions. It also teaches the person more healthy ways to deal with their anger moving forward such as exercise, journaling, and other ways that we discussed earlier. As we mentioned in the introduction, studies have shown that alcohol has been the contributing factor to more violent acts than any other substance of abuse, but why exactly is that? Well, according to some scientists this answer can be chalked up to something known as Alcohol Myopia Theory.
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Afterward, they either drank an alcoholic beverage (orange juice mixed with alcohol) or a placebo (the same concoction but with minimal alcohol). But effects to other neurotransmitters, including gamma-aminobutyric acid (GABA) and glutamine, may also be involved. So, someone may not be able to grasp the bigger picture of a situation. Instead, they may zoom in on a particularly small thing and have Alcohol Use Disorder an overly aggressive response (2). It affects parts of your brain responsible for movement, memory, self-control, and basic functions like hunger and thirst. Being overly polite might seem kind, but it often leads to problems anyway, in relationships, with friends, and at work.
- They argue that aggression is driven by maladaptive regulation of negative affect and particularly anger.
- Exposure to conflicting health information also appears to produce a temporary reduction in the person’s ability to focus attention and hold information in their memory.
- Over time, alcohol also changes the brain chemistry which can lead to even more mental health problems which, in turn, can lead to the person needing to drink more and more to deal with it all.
- It happens because such a person would seek escape from the painful thoughts of previous trauma or abuse.
Alcohol and aggression
When alcohol enters the equation, its impact on our neurobiology becomes essential to understand. Like emotional eating, people often practice emotional drinking to numb the pain they feel. Everyone breaks down booze differently due to variations in enzymes called ADH and ALDH2. These genetic differences can influence how much someone is affected by alcohol – including whether they’re more likely to become aggressive after drinking.
- People with co-occurring disorders should receive specialized treatment.
- It can be emotionally devastating to watch a person you love sink to their lowest version under the influence of alcohol.
- Extreme happiness, or euphoria, is another common experience during drinking.
- Another study of 249 heavy drinkers similarly found that alcohol intoxication predicted higher levels of IPV in those who reported low psychological flexibility (Grom et al., 2021).
Influence of alcohol on the expression of hidden emotions
If you have a natural tendency to be angry, drinking alcohol may cause you to become aggressive. “Trait anger” refers to a person’s general tendency to experience chronic anger over time. An angry person tends to seek out stimuli that activate feelings of anger. This may explain why they are angry more often and act more aggressively than someone who does not have this personality trait. The benefits of addressing the cognitive dissonance created by conflicting personal beliefs regarding alcohol’s effects are the basis of a clinical approach to managing alcohol consumption known as motivational interviewing. Its guiding principles can be used to enhance efforts at self-management.
And recording your alcohol consumption may help you to hold yourself accountable if you plan to cut back. Taking notes on your drinking patterns, amounts consumed, triggers, and emotional responses can aid in gaining better control. It may be that rather than making people angry, alcohol makes people who are prone to anger more likely to act on those feelings. This idea aligns with the understanding alcohol and aggression that drinking reduces behavioral inhibitions.
