Helping Hands

HOW WELL YOU REMEMBER YOUR FIRST DRINK may help indicate your chances of becoming an alcoholic, according to Dr. Albert D. Ullman of Tufts University. Studies of alcohol addicts show that their first drink was more emotionally arousing and thus easier to remember than the first drink of the normal drinker, says Dr. Ullman. A test comparing college students with a group of alcoholics in their memories of the first drinking experience showed that although a majority of the students remembered the first drink, a significantly greater number of alcoholics remembered theirs, and in more detail. It was a more anxiety-loaded experience for the alcoholic and more of them became intoxicated the first time. In all there were six characteristics of the first drinking experience of the alcoholics and the students that were significantly different: memory of the first drink; age at that time; whether or not they became intoxicated; where they had the first drink; who was present; and how soon after did they have the second drink.