Proximal relationships between PTSD symptoms and drinking among female college students: Results from a daily monitoring study.

Abstract

The self-medication hypothesis has been proposed to explain comorbidity between PTSD and drinking, whereupon problem drinking develops as an attempt to modulate negative affect and ameliorate PTSD symptoms. Studies have begun utilizing daily monitoring methodologies to refine our understanding of proximal relations between PTSD, affect, and alcohol use. 136 female college drinkers with a past history of sexual victimization and 38 female college drinkers with no past trauma history, completed electronic monitoring of PTSD symptoms, affect, alcohol use, and alcohol cravings, daily for 4 weeks. A two-part mixed hurdle model was used to examine likelihood of drinking and amount of alcohol consumed on drinking days. We did find significant relationships between daily PTSD symptoms, affect, and drinking. On days women experienced more intrusive and behavioral avoidance symptoms of PTSD they experienced stronger urges to drink and were more likely to drink on that day. On days where women experienced more negative affect than their average, they experienced stronger urges to drink whereas on days where women experienced more of the dysphoric symptoms associated with PTSD than their average, they drank less. On days with higher positive affect women reported stronger urges to drink and were more likely to drink. Results suggest the need to examine both aspects of affect and specific PTSD symptoms as they may differentially predict drinking behavior. Differences in the ways in which PTSD symptoms and affect influence drinking suggest that interventions more specifically address the function of drinking behaviors in reducing alcohol use among college women.

Ecological momentary assessment in the investigation of craving and substance use in daily life: A systematic review

“…Stress was found correlated with higher craving for tobacco (McCarthy et al, 2006;Van Zundert et al, 2011) and cocaine (Preston and Epstein, 2011). Positive affect was also reported correlated with craving for tobacco Dunbar et al, 2010;Ferguson et al, 2006;O'Connell et al, 2004), alcohol (Kaysen et al, 2014), and cocaine craving (Kennedy et al, 2013).…”

“…Alcohol studies: During pre-quit periods (or among subjects that do not want to quit), one study reported a significant positive association between craving and alcohol use in the following minutes (Ray et al, 2010), and another study with alcohol use over subsequent hours (Kaysen et al, 2014).…”

Depressive symptoms and alcohol and drugs consumption in the female universe

“…In this sense, it is stated as the most frequent psychiatric comorbidities: anxiety disorders (social phobia, simple phobia and post-traumatic stress disorder) and mood disorders (depression and mania) [15,16]. Similarly, other studies of comorbidities found that women who are alcohol users have anxiety disorders and depression as the most frequent psychiatric diagnoses [17][18].…”

Sexual Assault History and Its Association With the Use of Drinking Protective Behavioral Strategies Among College Women

“…Over the course of 2 years, a random sample of 11,544 undergraduate women was obtained from the university registrar's office and recruited through mail and email. These women were invited to complete an online screening questionnaire via email and U.S. mail to determine their eligibility for the study (described in Kaysen et al, 2014). Of the students who completed the screening survey (n = 4,342; 37.6%), 860 (20%) met the study criteria of (a) consuming four or more drinks on one occasion at least twice in the past month, and (b) either reporting no history of trauma exposure or reporting sexual victimization (at least one incident of CSA or ASA before the past 3 months) and completed an online baseline assessment.…”