How do alcoholics get to AA?

Stages of Affiliation with Alcoholics Anonymous

How do alcoholics get to AA?¹

AA has grown to over 100,000 groups with more than two million members simply on word-of-mouth recommendation. Often the recommendation has come from friends, family, employers, healthcare workers or law courts.

People progress through stages of affiliation with others and with Alcoholics Anonymous in pursuit of solutions to their problems. Two paths are identified; Direct Affiliation and Facilitated Affiliation².

The stages are not necessarily discrete where a person moves in clear progression from one stage to the next. A person is more likely to move up and down, sometimes jumping a stage in regression or progression. However, AA reports that 51% of current members stayed sober from their first meeting.

Facilitation plays a significant part in the process of AA affiliation as approximately 60%³ of AA members seek help from the helping professions prior to attending AA.

These stages of affiliation generally follow Prochaska and DiClemente Stages of Change model and are;