Does Social Capital Lower the Likelihood of Becoming Binge Drinkers Among Grades 9 and 10 High School Students? A Cross-National Comparison of Adolescents in Victoria, Australia, and Washington State, USA

Introduction: It has been demonstrated that social capital was associated with adolescent alcohol and drug use.  Previous studies have shown that drinking rates are higher among Australian adolescents than there same-aged American peers, partly due to the different alcohol policies adopted at the national level.  The purpose of the study is to explore the protective effect of social capital on the memberships of adolescent self-reported drinking behaviours among a sample of 9^th and 10^th graders in two country contexts.    

Methods: Using prospective data from adolescents that participated in the International Youth Development Study (IYDS), students were interviewed when they were in Grade 9 and resurveyed one year later. State-representative cohorts were sampled from the state of Victoria (VIC; N=961), Australia, and the state of Washington (WA; N=975), USA.  Latent Transition Analysis (LTA) was utilised to model longitudinal transitions.

Results: A five-latent-class LTA was found to be best described the heterogeneity of Grade 9 peer groups in both states.  The peer groups identified were non-drinkers with or without drinking peers, experimenters with or without drinking peers, drinkers with drinking peers, and bingers with drinking peers.  The prevalences of the binger subgroup were 33% in Grade 9 (vs. 16% in WA) and 51% in Grade 10 in VIC (vs. 23% in WA).  This group of bingers also displayed high stability of remaining as bingers one year later in Grade 10 (probability = 0.89 in VIC vs. 0.69 in WA).  Ninth graders who had started experimenting with alcohol and associated with drinking peers showed high probabilities of transitioning into binger subgroup one year later.  For example, current drinkers who associated with drinking peers in Grade 9 had a 59% and 42% chance, respectively for VIC and WA, of becoming bingers with drinking peers in Grade 10.  Opportunities for prosocial Involvement at school and in the family were identified previously as significant covariates that moderated prospective transitions between latent memberships.  The level of social capital at family- and school- level will be incorporated into the LTA models while controlling for family risk factors.  The effect of social capital on the probability of becoming bingers will be reported.     

Conclusions: Identification of protective factors is important in order to identify appropriate point of focus for prevention programs. The protective role of social capital in different country contexts can inform intervention strategies in enhancing connectedness and prosocial involvement in family and school.