Problem drinking from young adulthood to adulthood: patterns, predictors and outcomes.

ABSTRACT. Objective: Alcohol misuse is substantially infl uenced by social factors, but systematic assessments of social network drinking are typically lengthy. The goal of the present study was to provide further validation of a brief measure of social network alcohol use, the Brief Alcohol Social Density Assessment (BASDA), in a sample of emerging adults. Specifi cally, the study sought to examine the BASDA's convergent, criterion, and incremental validity in relation to well-established measures of drinking motives and problematic drinking. Method: Participants were 354 undergraduates who were assessed using the BASDA, the Alcohol Use Disorders Identifi cation Test (AUDIT), and the Drinking Motives Questionnaire. Results: Signifi cant associations were observed between the BASDA index of alcohol-related social density and alcohol misuse, social motives, and conformity motives, supporting convergent validity. Criterion-related validity was supported by evidence that signifi cantly greater alcohol involvement was present in the social networks of individuals scoring at or above an AUDIT score of 8, a validated criterion for hazardous drinking. Finally, the BASDA index was signifi cantly associated with alcohol misuse above and beyond drinking motives in relation to AUDIT scores, supporting incremental validity. Conclusions: Taken together, these fi ndings provide further support for the BASDA as an effi cient measure of drinking in an individual's social network. Methodological considerations as well as recommendations for future investigations in this area are discussed. (J. Stud. Alcohol Drugs, 74, 810-815, 2013)

mentioning

confidence: 99%

Brief Report: The Brief Alcohol Social Density Assessment (BASDA): Convergent, Criterion-Related, and Incremental Validity

MacKillop

Acker

Bollinger

et al. 2013

“…First, there is a need to track fi rst-and second-year undergraduates at closer time intervals using multiple measures of consumption within the context of a semester, because signifi cant and abrupt changes occur frequently in the individual drinking trajectories of teenagers and young adults (Bennett et al, 1999;Jackson et al, 2001;Rutledge and Sher, 2001;Schulenberg et al, 1996). Second, virtually nothing is known about the relation between objectively measured drinking, especially episodic intoxication and academic performance.…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

Undergraduate Drinking and Academic Performance: A Prospective Investigation With Objective Measures

Thombs

Olds

Bondy

et al. 2009

ABSTRACT. Objective: Findings from previous prospective research suggest the association between alcohol use and undergraduate academic performance is negligible. This study was designed to address weaknesses of the past research by relying on objective measures of both drinking and academic performance. Method: A prospective study was conducted with repeated measures of exposure to alcohol linked to institutional academic records. Alcohol data were collected in residence halls at a nonselective, midwestern, public university in the United States. A total of 659 fi rst-and second-year undergraduate students were tracked over the course of 15-week semesters. Results: A statistically signifi cant negative association with semester academic performance was found for different alcohol indicators: frequency of breath alcohol concentration (BrAC) above .08, mean BrAC, standard deviation, and maximum BrAC recorded. These associations remained statistically signifi cant when controlled for sociodemographic variables and individual level confounders, but the effect sizes were relatively small with a contribution to explained variance of less than 1%. When additionally adjusted for residence hall building, all alcohol indicators no longer reached statistical signifi cance (p ≥ .05). Conclusions: Consistent with past prospective research, the magnitude of the association between undergraduate alcohol use and academic performance is small when the effects of high school academic aptitude and performance are accounted for in multivariable analyses. This is the fi rst study to fi nd that living environment may have a robust effect on the academic achievement of undergraduates. Future research should examine more closely the relation between residence and academic performance and the role that alcohol use may play in creating residential environments. (J. Stud. Alcohol

“…Guo et al (2000) found that youths diagnosed with an alcohol-use disorder at age 21 were more likely than youths with no disorder to have begun or already have been drinking in middle school and were more likely to have reported heavy episodic drinking in high school. Bennett et al (1999) used cluster analyses to identify four alcohol-use patterns across two time points covering 7 years among a sample ages 18-31 who were not abstainers: youth-limited problem drinkers, stable moderate drinkers, developmentally persistent problem drinkers, and stable low drinkers. Developmentally persistent problem drinkers showed higher levels of problem behaviors in adulthood than did youth-limited drinkers.…”

Section: Change In Alcohol Usementioning

confidence: 99%

“…However, little is known about who will continue problem drinking patterns into young adulthood and who will stop (Bennett et al, 1999;Jackson et al, 2001). In considering what might be associated with problematic adolescent alcohol use either concurrently or in later years, researchers have suggested a number of variables.…”

Section: Change In Alcohol Usementioning

confidence: 99%

See 1 more Smart Citation

Alcohol Use Among American Indian High School Youths From Adolescence and Young Adulthood: A Latent Markov Model

Mitchell

Beals

Whitesell

2008

ABSTRACT. Objective:We explored patterns of alcohol use among American Indian youths as well as concurrent predictors and developmental outcomes 6 years later. Method: This study used six semi-annual waves of data collected across 3 years from 861 American Indian youths, ages 14-20 initially, from two western tribes. Using a latent Markov model, we examined patterns of change in latent states of adolescent alcohol use in the past 6 months, combining these states of alcohol use into three latent statuses that described patterns of change across the 3 years: abstainers, inconsistent drinkers, and consistent drinkers. We then explored how the latent statuses differed, both initially and in young adulthood (ages 20-26). Results: Both alcohol use and nonuse were quite stable across time, although we also found evidence of change. Despite some rather troubling drinking patterns as teens, especially among consistent drinkers, most of the youths had achieved important tasks of young adulthood. But patterns of use during adolescence were related to greater levels of substance use in young adulthood. Conclusions: Latent Markov modeling provided a useful categorization of alcohol use that more fi nely differentiated those youths who would otherwise have been considered inconsistent drinkers. Findings also suggest that broad-based interventions during adolescence may not be the most important ones; instead, programs targeting later alcohol and other drug use may be a more strategic use of often limited resources. (J. Stud. Alcohol Drugs 69: [666][667][668][669][670][671][672][673][674][675] 2008)