Acculturative Stress as a Predictor of Experimentation versus Heavy Substance Use Among Mexican-heritage Early Adolescents

Acculturative stress, defined as an adverse condition that is related to cultural adaptation for immigrant and ethnic minority children, has also consistently been linked to substance use among Mexican-heritage youth. However, many researchers are left to speculate about the predictive effects of acculturative stress on substance use outcomes in the absence of a sound measure of the concept and the longitudinal data that is necessary to accurately assess the temporal sequence of effects. This study directly measures acculturative stress and examines its longitudinal relation to alcohol, cigarette, marijuana, and inhalant use among a sample of 1,731Mexican-heritage students in grades 5-8 that participated in a prevention program from 2004-2008. Two-part latent growth curve modeling assessed changes over 6 waves in recent alcohol, marijuana, cigarette and inhalant use. This approach allows for the separate, yet simultaneous analysis, of the substance use distribution into two parts: substance use-versus-nonuse and, for those reporting any level of substance use, the last 30 day frequency of use, controlling for intervention effects, sex, age, school grades and SES. Results were consistent for alcohol, marijuana, and cigarettes. Acculturative stress, as a time-varying covariate, predicted use (versus nonuse) of these substances and higher frequency use of alcohol, marijuana, and cigarette, but this effect was only observed at wave 1. In addition to predicting use/non-use of inhalants, acculturative stress also predicted higher frequency inhalant use from waves 1 to 2 and waves 4 to 5. Models with acculturation stress as a lagged covariate closely resembled the non-lagged models.