Gender Differences in Links Between Alcohol-Specific Parenting Messages and Alcohol Use during College

Introduction. A wealth of research has demonstrated effects of parent-adolescent relationships and parenting behaviors on alcohol use during adolescence, however much less is known about whether and how parents impact the drinking behaviors of their children once they enter college and leave the family home (Turrisi et al., 2001). First-semester college students are less likely to engage in heavy episodic drinking on weekend days they spend more time communicating with their parents (Small et al., 2011), and parental permissibility of student drinking is positively associated with drinking quantity (Abar et al., 2012). Consistent with the idea that parents continue to matter during college (Wood et al., 2004), prevention efforts increasingly target parenting behaviors (Turrisi et al., 2009). Whether parental messages acknowledging alcohol use and encouraging students to be safe while drinking are realistic and harm-reducing or confer risk by condoning dangerous behaviors remains an important question. We test here whether mothers’ and fathers’ permissibility and communication about protective behavioral strategies (CPBS) predict male and female students’ alcohol use, independent of parent-adolescent relationship quality and prior drinking history.

Method. An analytic sample of 527 second-year undergraduate students at a large university in the northeastern United States was used. Two-step linear regression models assessed links of mother and father alcohol-specific parenting messages (permissibility, CPBS) with student heavy drinking frequency and maximum drinks. Step 1 included gender, relationship quality, permissibility, CPBS, and interactions of gender and permissibility and CPBS. Step 2 also controlled for prior alcohol use.

Results. Sophomore students who reported that their parents viewed it as acceptable for them to drink had higher binge drinking frequency and maximum drinks in the past 30 days. In models focused on mothers, after controlling for relationship quality and student prior drinking, a Gender x CPBS interaction showed that mothers who had higher CPBS had daughters with greater binge drinking frequency and maximum drinks consumed in the last 30 days. Although fathers engaged in a similar frequency of CPBS as did mothers, fathers’ CPBS were not associated with binge drinking frequency or maximum drinks for sons or daughters.

Conclusion. Consistent with prior research, parental permissibility predicted greater drinking. Links of CPBS with alcohol use differed by gender of parent and student. Discussion explores communication patterns in the four parent-student dyads, possible directions of effect in links between parental harm-reduction messages and drinking in college, and implications for prevention.