Parental Monitoring and Alcohol Use Across Adolescence in Black and White Girls: A Cross-Lagged Panel Mixture Model

• NCJ Number: 251876
• Journal: Alcoholism-Clinical and Experimental Research Volume: 41 Issue: 6 Dated: June 2017 Pages: 1144-1153
• Author(s): Shawn J. Latendresse; Feifei Ye; Tammy Chung; Alison Hipwell; Carolyn E. Sartor
• Date Published: June 2017
• Length: 10 pages
• Grant Number(s): 2013-JF-FX-0058
• Sponsoring Agency: Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention (OJJDP)
• Publication Format: Article
• Publication Type: Research (Applied/Empirical); Report (Study/Research); Report (Grant Sponsored); Program/Project Description
• Language: English
• Country: United States of America

Annotation

Given the lower rate of alcohol use despite evidence of lower levels of parental monitoring in Black compared to White youth, this study examined for whom and under what conditions parental monitoring and alcohol use are associated.

Abstract

The link between parental monitoring and adolescent alcohol use is well established, but the directionality of this relationship is somewhat elusive. The literature suggests that parental engagement serves a protective function with respect to alcohol use, but that parental monitoring may also diminish in response to recurrent risk behavior. Data were drawn from a community sample of 1,634 female adolescents (954 Black, 680 White) from four age cohorts, assessed annually in an accelerated longitudinal design. The study used data that spanned ages 12 to 17; parental monitoring and alcohol use were assessed via self‐report, and demographic and adolescent psychosocial risk factors were derived from parent reports when the girls were age 12. An autoregressive cross‐lagged panel mixture model was used to identify discrete patterns of parental monitoring and alcohol-use associations across adolescence, as well as psychosocial factors that differentiated between them. The study found two discrete patterns of co-developing alcohol use and parental monitoring; one had stable bidirectional and autoregressive links (79 percent) and another differing from the majority profile in terms of the absence (alcohol use to parental monitoring) and direction (parental monitoring to alcohol use) of cross‐construct influences (21 percent). Those in the minority profile were, at age 12, more likely to have received public assistance, resided in single‐parent households, reached puberty, and manifest more severe conduct problems. The study concludes that identifying subgroups of girls with distinct patterns of co-developing alcohol use and parental monitoring is particularly relevant to the development and implementation of family‐level interventions, both in terms of targeting those with known demographic risk factors, and tailoring programs to address behavioral correlates, such as conduct problems. (Publisher abstract modified)