Framing solutions: Adolescent girls and their relationships with alcohol.
Date
2003
Authors
Comeau, Margaret Nancy.
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
Dalhousie University
Abstract
Description
The purpose of the thesis is to learn more about the drinking behavior of adolescent girls at high personality risk of alcohol abuse. Feminist theory provides the conceptual and value framework for a three study empirical investigation that uses quantitative and qualitative research methods. Together, the three empirical studies were designed to add insight into our understanding of certain groups of at-risk girls' relationships with alcohol by exploring three inter-related questions.
Study 1 examined the question of how girls compare with boys in their relationships with alcohol. Anxiety sensitivity (AS) and sensation seeking (SS) are personality risk factors for alcohol use disorders, each associated with a different drinking motive (i.e., coping/conformity and enhancement, respectively). Study 1 investigated associations between these personality factors and drinking motives using Cooper's four categories of substance use motivations as applied to teens' use of alcohol and explored gender patterns. Findings support the adaptation of existing motive-specific brief interventions designed for clinical populations of adult women substance abusers for use in early intervention efforts with groups of at-risk teenage female drinkers.
The second research question, explored in Study 2, asks how girls at particular risk of alcohol abuse understand their relationships with alcohol. Two groups of female drinkers were recruited through the screening sample to participate in qualitative semi-structured interviews: (1) those with high AS; and (2) those high in the "intensity-seeking" component of SS. Interviews were conducted with AS and SS girls at particular risk of alcohol abuse by virtue of these specific personality factors associated with heavy drinking and alcohol problems. Study 2 data yield findings consistent with, but substantially extending, previous questionnaire-based research on the motives underlying alcohol use behavior in AS and SS adolescents in Study 1.
Study 3 focused on the third research question that asks how certain tailored alcohol abuse brief early interventions work for at-risk girls. These interventions were tested in a randomized controlled design in 4 high schools in Nova Scotia. Study 3 findings suggest promise for the personality-matched early interventions in reducing heavy and problem drinking, at least among teenage girls. (Abstract shortened by UMI.)
Thesis (Ph.D.)--Dalhousie University (Canada), 2003.
Study 1 examined the question of how girls compare with boys in their relationships with alcohol. Anxiety sensitivity (AS) and sensation seeking (SS) are personality risk factors for alcohol use disorders, each associated with a different drinking motive (i.e., coping/conformity and enhancement, respectively). Study 1 investigated associations between these personality factors and drinking motives using Cooper's four categories of substance use motivations as applied to teens' use of alcohol and explored gender patterns. Findings support the adaptation of existing motive-specific brief interventions designed for clinical populations of adult women substance abusers for use in early intervention efforts with groups of at-risk teenage female drinkers.
The second research question, explored in Study 2, asks how girls at particular risk of alcohol abuse understand their relationships with alcohol. Two groups of female drinkers were recruited through the screening sample to participate in qualitative semi-structured interviews: (1) those with high AS; and (2) those high in the "intensity-seeking" component of SS. Interviews were conducted with AS and SS girls at particular risk of alcohol abuse by virtue of these specific personality factors associated with heavy drinking and alcohol problems. Study 2 data yield findings consistent with, but substantially extending, previous questionnaire-based research on the motives underlying alcohol use behavior in AS and SS adolescents in Study 1.
Study 3 focused on the third research question that asks how certain tailored alcohol abuse brief early interventions work for at-risk girls. These interventions were tested in a randomized controlled design in 4 high schools in Nova Scotia. Study 3 findings suggest promise for the personality-matched early interventions in reducing heavy and problem drinking, at least among teenage girls. (Abstract shortened by UMI.)
Thesis (Ph.D.)--Dalhousie University (Canada), 2003.
Keywords
Psychology, Behavioral., Health Sciences, Public Health., Education, Health.