a Department of Sociology , Brigham Young University , Provo , Utah , USA.
Subst Use Misuse. 2018 Dec 6;53(14):2394-2404. doi: 10.1080/10826084.2018.1480037. Epub 2018 Jun 20.
Research on the association between cohabitation and substance use has been inconsistent, with some studies indicating an elevated risk among cohabiters and others finding either no difference in risk or a reduced risk of substance use. However, studies of this association have not utilized a causal modeling empirical framework.
The purpose of this research was to assess whether cohabitation has a causal effect on two forms of substance use among young adults: marijuana and heavy alcohol use.
Three waves of data from the National Survey of Youth and Religion (n = 2,202; 2002-2008), a representative sample of young adults in the United States, and an augmented inverse probability weighting (AIPW) model designed for multivalued treatment effects estimation, were used to assess the association between cohabitation and substance use.
The findings indicated that cohabitation was associated with more frequent marijuana use only among females. Much of the effect of cohabitation, though, was due to previous factors, including substance use, that affected whether young adults cohabit or not. Moreover, there was no evidence that cohabitation had a causal impact on heavy alcohol use. Conclusions/Importance: There is little evidence that cohabitation has a causal impact on substance use in general. However, among young women, those who cohabited reported higher levels of marijuana use than those who remained single. Future research should address why this group is at particular risk of substance use.
关于同居与物质使用之间的关联的研究结果并不一致，有些研究表明同居者的风险更高，而其他研究则发现同居者与非同居者之间的风险没有差异，或者同居者的物质使用风险更低。然而，这些关联的研究并未利用因果建模的实证框架。
本研究旨在评估同居是否对年轻人的两种物质使用形式（大麻和重度酒精使用）具有因果影响。
利用美国全国青年与宗教调查（National Survey of Youth and Religion，NSYR）的三波数据（n=2202；2002-2008 年），这是美国年轻人的代表性样本，以及一种用于多值处理效果估计的增强逆概率加权（augmented inverse probability weighting，AIPW）模型，评估同居与物质使用之间的关联。
研究结果表明，同居与女性更频繁地使用大麻有关，但同居的影响很大程度上是由于先前的因素，包括物质使用，这些因素影响了年轻人是否同居。此外，没有证据表明同居对重度酒精使用有因果影响。结论/重要性：几乎没有证据表明同居对物质使用总体有因果影响。然而，在年轻女性中，那些同居的人报告的大麻使用频率高于单身者。未来的研究应该探讨为什么这个群体特别容易出现物质使用问题。
