Personality, negative affect coping, and drinking alone: a structural equation modeling approach to examine correlates of adolescent solitary drinking.

Kasey G Creswell,Tammy Chung,Christopher S Martin,Jessica J Black,Aidan G C Wright,Duncan B Clark

doi:10.1111/add.12881

Kasey G Creswell, Tammy Chung + Show 4 more

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https://doi.org/10.1111/add.12881

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Abstract

This study examined the personality traits of negative emotionality and constraint and the ability to resist drinking during negative affective states as correlates of solitary drinking in adolescence. We hypothesized that higher levels of negative emotionality and lower levels of constraint would predict solitary drinking and that these relationships would be mediated by the ability to resist drinking in response to negative emotions. Structural equation modeling was used to fit a path model from the personality traits of negative emotionality and constraint to solitary drinking status through intermediate effects on the ability to resist drinking during negative emotions using cross-sectional data. Clinical and community settings in Pennsylvania, USA. The sample included 761 adolescent drinkers (mean age = 17.1). Adolescents completed the Lifetime Drinking History, the Multidimensional Personality Questionnaire, the Constructive Thinking Inventory and the Situational Confidence Questionnaire. The path model provided a good fit to the data. The association between trait negative emotionality and solitary drinking was fully mediated by adolescents' ability to resist drinking during negative affective states (b = 0.05, P = 0.01). In contrast, constraint had a direct effect on solitary drinking (odds ratio (OR) = 0.79, b = -0.23, P<0.01), as well as an indirect effect through the ability to resist drinking during negative affective states (b = -0.03, P = 0.02). The ability to resist drinking while experiencing negative feelings or emotions may be an important underlying mechanism linking trait negative emotionality (a tendency toward depression, anxiety and poor reaction to stress) and constraint (lack of impulsiveness) to adolescent solitary drinking.

Highlights

Alcohol use becomes increasingly prevalent across adolescence [1,2], but context is important when determining normative drinking behavior for this age group [3]
Such socially driven alcohol use has been considered by some researchers to be a normative aspect of psychosocial development, representing a marker for popularity, adjustment and how well-socialized adolescents are into their peer groups [3,4,5,6]
The percentage of solitary drinkers reported here differs from our prior paper due to a difference in the assessment time-frame across the two studies

Summary

Introduction

Alcohol use becomes increasingly prevalent across adolescence [1,2], but context is important when determining normative drinking behavior for this age group [3]. Adolescent drinking usually occurs with friends [1]. Such socially driven alcohol use has been considered by some researchers to be a normative aspect of psychosocial development, representing a marker for popularity, adjustment and how well-socialized adolescents are into their peer groups [3,4,5,6]. Solitary drinking (i.e. drinking while alone) is relatively common and is not in itself a risk factor for alcohol-related problems [7,8,9]. Solitary drinking during adolescence is considered deviant. In the Monitoring the Future Study, 94% of high school seniors reported that they either never drank alone or had done so just a few times [10]

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