WOMEN'S DRINKING: SECONDARY ANALYSES OF 20-YEAR DATA

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This application proposes new analyses of unique 20-year national survey data on women's drinking and its antecedents and outcomes. The National Study of Health and Life Experiences of Women (NSHLEW) interviewed representative national samples of U.S. women in 1981, 1991, 1996, and 2001. The 2001 survey data make it possible to evaluate new models of long-term influences on women's drinking behavior and drinking trajectories, and also provide detailed information about respondents' use of prescribedpsychoactive medications, new information about older women's health, and lifetime drinking histories replicating and extending those obtained 20 years earlier. The proposed analyses will (1) test multi-wave models of long-term influences on women's hazardous drinking; (2) identify patterns, antecedents, and consequences of women's drinking trajectories; (3) evaluate (a) the reliability and utility of retrospective drinking histories (e.g., to identify drinking trajectories), (b) contextual influences of employment on women's drinking, (c) associations of lifetime drinking patterns with older women's health, and (d) antecedents and consequencesof women's combined use of alcohol and prescribed medications; and (4) compare drinking self-reports obtained from typical quantity-frequency questions vs. graduated-frequency questions. Structural equation models combining retrospective data and three waves of survey data will be used to test hypothesized effects on women's drinking from (1) early childhood experiences, (2) sexual victimization in childhood and adulthood, and (3) characteristics of adult intimate relationships. Drinking trajectories (classified by latent growth mixture modeling and by a priori criteria) will be analyzedfor associations with antecedents (as in childhood), accompanying changes (as in marital status), and outcomes (such as health problems). Trajectories derived from lifetime drinking histories, if shown to be reliable, will be evaluated similarly. Other analyses will test hypotheses about (1) historical change in contextual effects of employment on women's drinking, (2) the health of older women with different lifetime drinking histories, and (3) consequencesof combined use of alcohol with prescribed psychoactive medications. A methodological experiment will show whether women report higher levels of alcohol consumption in response to graduated-frequency questions than to questions about typical drinking frequency and quantity. Results of the secondary analyses proposed here will improve knowledge about women's lifetime drinking and its antecedents and consequences, in ways that can aid the design of more gender-sensitive and effective approaches to treatment, prevention, and alcohol policy.