Alcohol and Violence

William Alex Pridemore

Many people assume that there is a relationship between alcohol and violence. Even many scholars take the alcohol-violence association for granted and believe there is little to explain. Yet innumerable people consume alcohol, often in large quantities, in countless settings every day without violent outcomes. Even in most bars, which provide a seemingly combustible mix of strangers drinking a considerable amount of alcohol, truly violent events are rare. Thus, what many assume to be true quickly turns into a challenge: if there is in fact an association, we must discover the specific moderating and mediating factors across a range of units of analysis that increase the likelihood of violence when alcohol is consumed. Thus, unlike other entries in this collection that focus on a single theory, this entry describes several theories linking alcohol to violence. While many of the theories discussed here are distinct, some overlap and may span units ...

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