Roman Mella, MF;
(2017)
Adolescent drinking in Chile: the role of school socioeconomic environment in relation to parental and peer influences.
Doctoral thesis (Ph.D), UCL (University College London).
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Abstract
School socioeconomic environment in relation to adolescent drinking has hardly been studied. Taking Chile as an example of a highly socially stratified education system, this study focused on how adolescent drinking patterns relate to school socioeconomic environment. Two potential mechanisms for this relationship were examined: interaction with parental supervision and mediation by friends’ drinking behaviours. Multilevel analyses were conducted on cross-sectional data with a four-level nested structure: students (L1), school classes (L2), schools (L3) and municipalities (L4). Individual-level information was extracted from a nationally representative survey (N=58,148, aged 13 to 18) conducted in 2013 and linked to school-level data (N=1,687). Multilevel logistic regression was used to analyse non-binge drinking (vs. non-drinking) and binge drinking (vs. non-binge drinking). The frequency of binge drinking was analysed using multilevel zero-inflated Poisson regression. Models were stratified by gender and adjusted for sociodemographic and parental characteristics and school type. The results showed that both non-binge drinking and binge drinking were socioeconomically patterned at school level. Boys and girls from more socially disadvantaged schools were less likely to drink alcohol than those from more advantaged schools. Within the group of drinkers, school social disadvantage was positively associated with binge drinking in boys and girls. Results also suggested that boys attending socially advantaged schools were likely to binge drink. However, the number of events of binge drinking in the past month was unrelated to school socioeconomic environment. Both parental knowledge of children’s whereabouts and school socioeconomic environment were independently associated with adolescent drinking patterns. There was no evidence to suggest mediation through levels of friends’ drinking within the school context. Schools play a role shaping adolescent drinking and should be integrated into a multilevel approach to tackle adolescent alcohol use, especially binge drinking.
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