What Role Do Changes in the Demographic Composition Play in the Declining Trends in Alcohol Consumption and the Increase of Non-drinkers Among Swedish Youth? A Time-series Analysis of Trends in Non-drinking and Region of Origin 1971–2012

Abstract

AimNon-drinkers among youth in Sweden have increased markedly during the last 15 years. The aim of this study is to investigate the temporal association between region of origin among Swedish youth and rates of non-drinking.Data and methodData on non-drinkers were obtained from The Swedish Council on Information and Other drugs (CAN) yearly school surveys among Swedish ninth-grade students over the period 1971–2013. Annual data of region of origin for 1968–2012 has been compiled from Statistics Sweden (SCB) and consists of all 15-year-olds in Sweden and their region of birth; Sweden, The Nordic Countries, Europe, The Middle East and the rest of the world. Autoregressive Integrated Moving Average (ARIMA) modelling was applied in order to estimate these associations.ResultsDescriptive results revealed a change in the demography of Swedish 15- to 16-year-olds. In the early 1990s 1% of Swedish 15- to 16–year-olds were born in a Middle East country, this proportion increased to 6% in 2012. Furthermore, those born in the rest of the world (non-European or non-Nordic countries) increased from 1% to almost 4%. Similarly, the trend of non-drinkers increased from about 20% to more than 40% among Swedish 15- to 16-year-olds during the same period. However, a more thorough analysis using ARIMA modelling revealed no significant association between rates of region of origin and non-drinking.ConclusionThe marked increase in non-drinkers during the last 15 years is not associated to changes in the demographic composition, in terms of region of origin, among Swedish youth.

Immigration and the decline in adolescent binge drinking

“…However, the majority of the decline is attributable to native majority adolescents drinking less -particularly young teenagers and boys. Our finding that an increasing proportion of adolescents from immigrant backgrounds is an important contributing factor to the recent decline in HE drinking is contradictory to the conclusion by Svensson and Andersson (2015). This discrepancy may be due to our use of individual-level data, or the fact that we studied an urban population with a higher proportion of adolescents from immigrant backgrounds.…”

“…With an increasing proportion of immigrants and children of immigrants from low-consumption countries in the adolescent population, immigration may play a key role in many national contexts. However, only one study, by Svensson and Andersson (2015), seems to have assessed this empirically. Their time-series analysis revealed that trends in adolescent drinking and proportions of adolescents with immigrant backgrounds were unrelated.…”

One explanation to rule them all? Identifying sub‐groups of non‐drinking Swedish ninth graders

“…Similar trends have been reported from several countries . Previous studies have focused on examining the association between youth drinking and exogenous factors without finding any significant associations , and this development remains unexplained. One reason for this could be that the previous studies have examined the association between youth drinking and one other factor.…”

Benefits and drawbacks of social non‐drinking identified by British university students

“…This has been found among British 16-24-year-olds (40% increase in non-drinkers over 8 years [12]), Australian 14-17-year-olds (17.3% increase over 10 years [13]) and Swedish 15-16-year-olds (20% increase over 15 years, [14]). Epidemiological evidence has been used to illustrate theoretical accounts of how contextual factors underlie the decline in smoking behaviour including changes in material circumstances (e.g.…”