Young heavy drinkers and their drinking experiences: predictors of later alcohol use.

This study illustrated the impact of late adolescent and young adult alcohol experiences on current level of alcohol use. Additional factors investigated include reported age of problem onset, initial age of alcohol use, marital status, and life-span risk-taking behavior. A stepwise discriminant analysis was used to determine the importance of various subtypes of drinking experiences and combinations of these subtypes. Correct classification of current light and heavy alcohol drinkers by use of these experiences was 83.7% for late adolescent experiences and 77.5% for young adulthood experiences. The results suggest that early drinking experiences are useful predictors of future drinking patterns.