This application proposes school-based research on the relation of religiosity and spirituality to alcohol use over the developmental period from early through middle adolescence. Data will be obtained through questionnaires administered in classrooms to samples of 7th graders, 8th graders, 9th graders, and 10th graders (total N = 4,800); the research will span the age range from 12 through 16 years. The samples of public school students will be approximately 30% African- American, 25% Hispanic, and 35% Caucasian. Criterion variables will include use (vs. nonuse) of alcohol, frequency and quantity of alcohol use, and alcohol use problems. Predictor variables will include religious affiliation (vs. none), frequency of attendance, importance of religious values, religious coping, and religious beliefs. Basic analyses will test religiosity and spirituality measures as protective factors for involvement in alcohol use, including controls for demographic characteristics and for relevant personality variables. Measures are designed so that the research can test for effects of religiosity in predicting alcohol use (vs. abstention), experimental drinking, and heavy drinking. The research will test a mediational model, positing that the relation between religiosity and alcohol use is mediated through coping patterns, positive affectivity, norms about alcohol use, and patterns of peer affiliation. Buffering effects will be analyzed to test the hypothesis that high religiosity reduces the impact of negative life events on alcohol use. Differences in predictive effects by age, gender, and ethnicity will be tested. The results will have implications for understanding the mechanism of relationships between religiosity and alcohol use, and will have implications for design of prevention programs in school or community settings.
| Walker, Carmella; Ainette, Michael G; Wills, Thomas A et al. (2007) Religiosity and substance use: test of an indirect-effect model in early and middle adolescence. Psychol Addict Behav 21:84-96 |
| Wills, Thomas Ashby; Gibbons, Frederick X; Gerrard, Meg et al. (2003) Family communication and religiosity related to substance use and sexual behavior in early adolescence: a test for pathways through self-control and prototype perceptions. Psychol Addict Behav 17:312-23 |
