Bidirectional Relationships Between Parental Socialization Behaviors and Adolescent Alcohol Misuse: A Developmental Perspective

Introduction: Adolescent alcohol misuse is a significant public health problem, resulting in immediate and long-term consequences across physical, social and emotional domains. As a proximal source of influence to the developing child, the family is an important dimension for prevention efforts related to youth alcohol use. While much is known regarding the risk and protective influence of parents on adolescent alcohol misuse, very little research has examined the reciprocal nature of these relationships. The purpose of this study is to assess bidirectional influences between seven parental socialization behaviors and teen alcohol misuse. The study utilizes a developmental approach to assess the stability and change of these bidirectional influences across early and middle adolescence. The goal of the study is to inform family-based interventions and public health policy to prevent risky drinking during adolescence.

Methods: This research was a secondary data analysis of a longitudinal study of adolescent health risk behaviors comprising data from parent-adolescent dyads (N=1645). Separate models were estimated between teen alcohol misuse and each of seven parental behaviors (three general: closeness, support, behavioral control and four specific to alcohol: permissive and negative messages about alcohol, alcohol-specific monitoring, parental alcohol use) across grades 6-11. Study analyses utilized a multivariate latent curve model with structured residuals, an extension of the autoregressive latent trajectory model. This model with structured residuals was chosen because of its unique ability to disaggregate within- and between-person effects on the stability and change of the proposed relationship between variables over time. This study focused on within-person effects including the stability of each behavior and the prospective relations between parental and adolescent behavior over time.

Results: Teen alcohol misuse demonstrated significant stability across repeated measures in all models (p=.000). Both parental permissive (p=.013) and negative messages (p=.000) regarding alcohol use were stable across time. Increased adolescent alcohol misuse prospectively predicted higher parental alcohol-specific monitoring (p=.036), and the magnitude of this effect was equal across time. All other prospective relations were non-significant.

Conclusions: Results of this study are the first to examine bidirectional influences between parental behavior and adolescent alcohol misuse. Prevention efforts should encompass how parents respond to their child’s drinking behaviors. While other proposed relationships were non-significant, results warrant further inquiry to more fully capture transactional processes between parents and children relative to alcohol misuse.