Does social support buffer the relationship between stressors and alcohol use?: Findings from immigrant sexual minority latinos in North Carolina

Background: Little is known about alcohol use among sexual minority Latinos, a sub-group including gay men, men who have sex with men who do not self-identify as gay, and gender variant or transgender persons. Complementing qualitative research that found drinking was a fundamentally social activity in this population, we tested whether social support buffered associations between social stressors and drinking.

Methods: We recruited 190 immigrant sexual minority Latinos via Respondent-Driven Sampling for psychosocial and behavioral assessments in Spanish or English. We tested whether associations between social stressors and drinking frequency (4-level categorical variable) and binge drinking (count of binge episodes in the past 30 days) varied by level of social support.

Results: English use was positively associated with binge drinking, but social support attenuated the relationship. Contrary to expectations, social support exacerbated the positive association between social comfort with gay men and weekly drinking. In addition, we identified 2 antagonistic interactions. First, personal comfort with sexual orientation was negatively associated with yearly drinking at low social support but at high social support the association was positive. Second, ethnic discrimination was positively associated with binge drinking at low social support but at high social support the association was negative.

Conclusions: We found mixed evidence that social support buffers the relationship between stressors and drinking among sexual minority Latinos. Due to the social patterning of alcohol use, social support may increase odds of some drinking. The antagonistic interactions suggest a complex and poorly understood relationship between social stressors, social support, and drinking.