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BEDREHELSE-Bedre helse og livskvalitet

EARLY INITIATION AND USE OF ALCOHOL THROUGH ADOLESCENCE Risks, precursors and developmental pathways from 18 months to 19 years

Awarded: NOK 6.0 mill.

Project Manager:

Project Number:

213759

Application Type:

Project Period:

2012 - 2018

Several research projects have studied the development of various drinking patterns in adolescence and the relationships between alcohol debut and alcohol consumption in adolescence and adulthood. Still, little has been known about the long-term significance of early childhood factors for adolescent drinking patterns and how various experiences with alcohol use are related to later drinking patterns. By taking advantage of data from several longitudinal, population-based studies of children and adolescents, linkage to national register data and advanced statistical methods, the aims of the Alcohol project have been to provide new knowledge on; 1) how early individual, family, and contextual risk factors are related to debut of alcohol use and drinking to intoxication and alcohol use behaviours in adolescence; 2) how, and to what extent, alcohol use debut and drinking to intoxication debut represent independent risk factors for the development of problem drinking in adolescence; 3) subgroups of adolescents following specific developmental patterns of drinking to intoxication across adolescence and factors in childhood that predict these patterns; 4) in what way drinking to intoxication is related to common mental health problems across the adolescent epoch, and 5) how and to what extent drinking to intoxication is related to mental health, education and work status in adulthood. Data from the Tracking Opportunities and Problems (TOPP)-study, Young in Norway (YiN) -study, International Youth Development Study (IYDS), Australian Temperament Project (ATP) and from national registers have been utilized. Findings from the project have contributed to the identification of children and adolescents at risk for developing alcohol use problems before alcohol problems are established. Thus, the project results are relevant for the development of preventive interventions. Main findings from the project has been communicated to relevant Norwegian and international academic communities and to the Norwegian public. To date, the project has produced several publications in international, peer-reviewed journals, focusing on 1) Variations in drinking patterns in different city districts in Oslo and how these differences are related to socio demographic factors, and 2) Changes in adolescent alcohol use and binge drinking over 18 years, from 1992 to 2010, 3) Perceived harm related to the use of alcohol, marijuana and tobacco among students in urban and rural Norway, 4) How adolescent characteristics, characteristics of their friends and the adolescents families are related to early onset of drinking and early onset of intoxication, and 5) A cohort paper on the TOPP-study that places the current project in the context of the larger main study, and 6) Identifying groups of youths that follow similar patterns of intoxication drinking across adolescence (trajectories) and how mental health problems in childhood are related to these trajectories. Furthermore, two manuscripts are under peer review in international journals and two manuscripts are in progress. These have examined 1) Whether early onset of drinking, independent of early onset of excessive drinking, is prospectively related to hazardous drinking in late adolescence/young adulthood in Norway and Australia, two countries with different prevention policies and drinking cultures, 2) How intoxication drinking through adolescence is associated with subsequent outcomes with regard to education, income and possible risk of unemployment and disability, 3) The mutual prospective relationship between depression, conduct problems and drinking to intoxication across adolescence, and 4) Positive and negative aspects of mental health at the threshold to adulthood as outcome of various trajectories of drinking to intoxication across adolescence. Furthermore, the project has contributed knowledge to various professional communities and the general public in several ways. We have publishing two book chapters focusing on adolescent alcohol consumption in a developmental perspective as part of a book on the TOPP-study, printed by Hogrefe Publishers. The project has also publishing opinion pieces on Forebygging.no, a knowledge base for drug prevention and health promotion, and NRK Ytring, which is a public service broadcasting channel. These articles recommends preventive efforts aimed at reducing problem drinking in adolescence should target children with chronic externalizing behaviours and negative social development, and the need for prevention and early intervention efforts to be implemented early in developmental pathways. In addition, the project has been presented at 11 international and national conferences and meetings over the past years, among them at (Norwegian) National Seminar for Workers in the Drug Field, Nordic Alcohol and Drug Researcher's Assembly, and at a Youth Health Conference in Melbourne Australia.

The project seek to extend our knowledge on alcohol initiation and use of alcohol in adolescence through examination of risk factors, underlying mechanisms and gender specific developmental pathways from infancy and onwards to alcohol initiation and use i n adolescence. Data is gathered from a longitudinal, prospective population based study that has followed children from 18 months to 19 years, with 8 waves of data collection. Numerous projects have studied developmental paths to alcohol outcomes in ado lescence and the relationship between age of onset and alcohol use. Still, there is a gap of knowledge regarding long-term developmental paths to adolescent alcohol initiation and consumption, and the relationship between these two outcomes. The wide sp an of variables measured in the current study, as well as the use of newer and more advanced statistical methods, increase our possibility to extend knowledge in areas like; 1) the relationships between early individual, family and contextual risk factors and developmental pathways to age of onset and alcohol use through adolescence, 2) whether and to what degree age of initiation is a unique risk factor for development of binge drinking and high consumption in adolescence, 3) possible interaction effec ts of predictors and the relative effects of moderating and mediating mechanisms, 4) subgroups following different trajectories of alcohol use through adolescence, and 5) whether there are gender specific developmental pathways to age of initiation and consumption of alcohol through adolescence. The results will facilitate detection of groups with increased risk for later alcohol problems before problematic alcohol consumption habits are established, thus, indicating areas in which preventive actions should be implemented. The results will be published in international peer reviewed journals. The conclusions will also be available in Norwegian through NIPH report series and other communication channels

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Funding scheme:

BEDREHELSE-Bedre helse og livskvalitet