Child Maltreatment, Fathers, and Adolescent Alcohol and Marijuana Use Trajectories

Abstract

Background:Little is known about heterogeneity in developmental trajectories of alcohol and marijuana use among at-risk youth.Objective: This study aims to examine how child maltreatment and father structural factors at different stages in the life course are associated with different patterns of alcohol and marijuana use trajectories.Methods: A sample of youth (N = 903) were drawn from the Longitudinal Studies of Child Abuse and Neglect (LONGSCAN). Latent class growth analysis was employed to assess heterogeneity in patterns of adolescent alcohol and marijuana use. In addition, binary logistic regression analysis was performed to examine child maltreatment and father structural factors across different developmental stages as predictors of membership in the identified alcohol and marijuana use trajectory classes.Results: For both alcohol and marijuana use, two distinct latent classes were identified: stable no/low alcohol use (74%) vs. increasing alcohol use (26%); stable no/low marijuana use (85%) vs. increasing marijuana use (15%). Emotional abuse during early childhood and physical abuse during adolescence predicted membership in the increasing alcohol use and the increasing marijuana use classes. The presence of father in the home during early childhood was associated with lower likelihood of being in the increasing alcohol use class. Conclusions:Our findings highlight the importance of understanding the etiology of adolescent substance use through a developmental lens. Screening of exposure to child maltreatment across different developmental stages and interventions promoting father engagement during early childhood might help mitigate the risk of adolescent alcohol and marijuana use.

The Relationship Between Childhood Physical and Sexual Abuse and Adolescent Cannabis Use: A Systematic Review

“…Only one of these papers ( 39 ) included interviews as part of the assessment. The remaining four papers ( 33 , 40 , 41 , 44 ) used data from child protective services records.…”

“…Three studies ( 34 , 35 , 44 ) differentiated outcomes based on the number or type of traumatic events. One study ( 34 ) made a differentiation between being sexually abused once or twice, three or more times and raped.…”

“…One study ( 44 ) differentiated between timing of abuse for the association with cannabis use. Odds of recent cannabis use aged 12–18 were increased amongst those reporting adolescent physical abuse (AOR 1.87, 95% CI 1.06–3.32), but were not significantly different among those reporting early childhood physical abuse (AOR 1.72, 95% CI 0.95–3.10), early childhood sexual abuse (AOR 0.55, 95% CI 0.25–1.21) and middle childhood sexual abuse (AOR 0.53, 95% CI 0.22–1.26).…”

“…*subjects lost to follow up unlikely to introduce bias -> 60 % follow up, or description provided of those lost; 0 follow up rate <60% and no description of those lost/no description of retention or sample loss. Total maximum: 8* 5 of the 11 studies reported weaker, non-significant evidence (33,(40)(41)(42)44). One study (37) stratified by gender and found a significant association in females (OR 2.18, 95% CI 1.84-2.59), but a non-significant association for males (OR 1.28, 95% CI 0.88-1.84).…”

“…The final study selection of 13 papers is fully shown in Figure 1. Characteristics of each of the included studies can be seen in both quality assessment table (Table 1) and data extraction table (Table 2) (32)(33)(34)(35)(36)(37)(38)(39)(40)(41)(42)(43)(44).…”