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APHA Scientific Session and Event Listing

Timothy Heeren, PhD¹, Michael R. Winter, MPH², and Ralph W. Hingson, ScD, MPH². (1) Department of Biostatistics, Boston University, School of Public Health, 715 Albany Street, Tablot E424, Boston, MA 02118, 617-683-5177, tch@bu.edu, (2) Youth Alcohol Prevention Center, Boston University School of Public Health, 715 Albany Street, 580, 3rd Floor, Boston, MA 02118-2526

Objectives: We examined the associations between age first drunk, high school and college drinking behavior, dependency symptoms and driving after drinking among college students. Methods: We analyzed students who ever drank (n=9,994) from the 1999 College Alcohol Study, a survey of 128 colleges. Latent variable structural equation models (SEMs) examined pathways from age first drunk to current driving after drinking. Parent education, attitudes toward drinking, and alcohol problems were included as covariates. Mediators included latent variables for high school and college drinking, and level of dependence symptoms. Perceived permissiveness of college drinking policy was included as a covariate. Driving after drinking was treated as a latent variable measured through frequency of driving after any drinking, heavy drinking, and riding with a drinking driver. Associations are measured through standardized adjusted path coefficients (β), and all coefficients presented below are significant at p<.05. Results: Earlier age first drunk is associated with riskier driving after drinking behavior and more dependence symptoms in unadjusted analyses. Age first drunk is associated with heavier high school drinking (β=-0.68 in SEM), which in turn is associated with heavier college drinking (β=0.42) and dependence symptoms (β=0.24). Controlling for college drinking behavior, high school drinking behavior remains significantly associated with college driving after drinking (β=0.22). Parental and college policy variables were much weaker predictors of these outcomes than high school drinking behavior. Conclusions: Early drinking behavior remains a risk factor for driving after drinking and dependence symptoms in college, controlling for the mediating effects of college drinking behavior.

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