Past studies indicate a dose-response relationship between alcohol and health issues such as cirrhosis of the liver and also a link between increased drinking and greater problems such as interpersonal violence. A study investigated the larger, cultural context of drinking in several European countries and assessed what impact this might have on the relationship between drinking and harm. The study found that this relationship is stronger in the Baltic countries and Sweden than Italy.
Jonas Landberg, a researcher at the Centre for Social Research on Alcohol and Drugs and sole author of the study used data collected from two general-population surveys of approximately 1,000 respondents from each country: Sweden, Italy, and the three Baltic countries. The data were analyzed for the risk of experiencing alcohol-related problems in relation to self-reported volumes of alcohol consumption in each country. This method has only once before been used for cross-national comparisons.
“My findings showed that most people who increased their consumption were at risk of experiencing some form of alcohol-related problems, but also that people who live in countries where drinking occasions often lead to intoxication -- for example, Sweden and the Baltic countries -- more often experience alcohol-related problems when they increase their alcohol consumption when compared to people who live in Italy, were the drinking primarily takes place with meals and less often leads to intoxication.”
These differences might depend on several factors, added Landberg. “The most important one is probably related to cultural differences in drinking patterns, that is, people in the northern part of Europe usually drink in a way that more often results in alcohol-related problems compared to people in southern Europe,” he said. “However, the results may also reflect cultural differences in how people regard alcohol and harm. For example, in a country like Sweden, where drinking is seen as problematic, alcohol often gets blamed for problems when someone has been drinking, while on the other hand, people may be less likely to blame problems on alcohol in a country like Italy, where alcohol is not regarded as problematic, but rather as a part of day-to-day life.”
Norström suggested that the alcohol-harm relationships tend to be stronger in the northern part of Europe due to the higher prevalence of heavy episodic drinking or “binge drinking” in northern Europe compared to southern Europe.

Results will be published in the January 2012 issue of Alcoholism: Clinical & Experimental Research and are currently available at Early View.