Dept. of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, University of Washington, Seattle, WA, USA.
Institute for Social Research, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI, USA.
Prev Sci. 2023 Aug;24(6):1239-1248. doi: 10.1007/s11121-023-01565-7. Epub 2023 Jun 24.
Adverse life events that threaten normative transitions are associated with increased alcohol and cannabis use among young adults. However, few studies have tested the extent to which specific negative events impact substance use behaviors nor identified relevant risk or protective factors (e.g., perceived control). During the COVID-19 pandemic, young adults experienced economic adversities (i.e., job loss and financial strain) at disproportionally high rates. This provided a unique opportunity to test associations between job loss/financial difficulties and substance use outcomes and whether perceived control in work and finance domains moderated these associations. Young adults completed self-report surveys at two time points-prior to the COVID-19 pandemic (January 2020) and in the acute phase of the pandemic (April/May 2020). Participants (N = 519; M = 25.4 years; 62.8% female) were recruited in and around Seattle, WA, as part of an ongoing longitudinal cohort study. Pandemic-related job loss (18.9%) and financial difficulty (49.7%) were relatively common in this sample. Job loss was associated with increased number of drinks on the heaviest past-month drinking occasion (from January 2020 to April/May 2020). Financial difficulty was associated with increased drinking frequency and number of drinks on the heaviest drinking occasion. The effect of job loss and financial difficulty on alcohol and cannabis use was generally moderated by participants' perceived control of these domains. For those with low perceived control, job loss/financial difficulty was associated with increased alcohol/cannabis use, but for those high in perceived control, job loss/financial difficulty was associated with decreased alcohol use frequency. Findings give advance understanding of how economic adversities relate to young adults' alcohol and cannabis use. Notably, perceived control over these domains may be modifiable through prevention efforts aiming to foster self-efficacy among young people and policy to provide available agency to those in need.
威胁到正常过渡的不良生活事件与年轻人中饮酒和吸食大麻的增加有关。然而，很少有研究测试特定的负面事件对物质使用行为的影响，也没有确定相关的风险或保护因素（例如，感知控制）。在 COVID-19 大流行期间，年轻人以不成比例的高比例经历了经济逆境（即失业和经济紧张）。这为测试失业/经济困难与物质使用结果之间的关联以及工作和财务领域的感知控制是否调节这些关联提供了一个独特的机会。年轻人在两个时间点完成了自我报告调查-在 COVID-19 大流行之前（2020 年 1 月）和大流行的急性阶段（2020 年 4 月/ 5 月）。参与者（N=519；M=25.4 岁；62.8%女性）是在华盛顿州西雅图及其周边地区招募的，作为一项正在进行的纵向队列研究的一部分。在这个样本中，与大流行相关的失业（18.9%）和经济困难（49.7%）相对普遍。失业与过去一个月最重饮酒量时的饮酒量增加有关（从 2020 年 1 月到 2020 年 4 月/ 5 月）。经济困难与饮酒频率增加和最重饮酒量时的饮酒量增加有关。参与者对这些领域的感知控制一般调节了失业和经济困难对酒精和大麻使用的影响。对于那些感知控制能力较低的人，失业/经济困难与酒精/大麻使用增加有关，但对于那些感知控制能力较高的人，失业/经济困难与酒精使用频率降低有关。这些发现使人们对经济逆境与年轻人的酒精和大麻使用之间的关系有了更深入的了解。值得注意的是，通过旨在培养年轻人自信心和为有需要的人提供可用机构的预防工作，这些领域的感知控制可能是可以改变的。
