Deconstructing the Adolescent Drinking Context: Identifying Micro-Ecological Risk Factors for Teens' Alcohol Abuse at Private Settings

Introduction:We investigated event-level characteristics that may contribute to youth drinking in the home context. Methods:We used survey data from 336 adolescents (15-18 years, 47.3% female) living in 24 midsized non-contiguous California cities and who reported having at least one drink at their own home or a friend’s home at their last drinking occasion. We obtained data about total drinks at that last event as well as contextual and situational characteristics, including adult presence, number of people present, whether the event occurred in the participant’s own home or a friend’s home, ease of alcohol access at the event, and the gender ratio of those present. We also obtained information on individual characteristics including past year frequency of being drunk, perceived drinking norms, age, race and gender. Data Analysis:To account for clustering of adolescents within cities and considering the nature of our outcome measure (i.e., number of drinks), we used multilevel Poisson regression to analyze the data. We stratified the analyses by gender. Results:Results for the full sample indicated that the number of people at the event was positively associated with drinking quantity. Perceived ease of alcohol access was also associated with consuming more drinks. Conversely, having a responsible adult present was associated with consuming fewer drinks. Older and male youth were more likely to drink more as were those who perceived greater alcohol use by their peers and those who reported more times being drunk in the past year.  A different pattern emerged for males and females. Among females, drinking at one’s own home and having a responsible adult present were associated with about a 20% decrease in the number of drinks consumed. The number of people at the event was unrelated to the number of drinks females consumed. Among males, a greater number of people at the event and ease of alcohol access were associated with consuming more drinks. Conversely the presence of more boys than girls was associated with consuming fewer drinks. Conclusions:Family-based interventions are unique because they can target both the family as a social-unit (e.g., parent child-relationships) but also as an environmental setting (e.g., supervision in the home). The current study suggests that parents could limit youth drinking behavior by placing constraints on the number of youth in the home; possibilities include supervision, rule making, or calling law enforcement. Parents could also influence the drinking environment by limiting the alcohol availability by locking liquor cabinets or monitoring alcohol use in the home. Lastly, more research is necessary around the role of adults who are present at a youth drinking event and why this differentially impacts females.