Date of Award

12-31-2018

Document Type

Campus Access Dissertation

Degree Name

Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)

Department

Nursing

First Advisor

Teri Aronowitz

Second Advisor

Ling Shi

Third Advisor

Sawitri Assanangkornchai

Abstract

Background: Youth alcohol consumption is a very serious issue in the world, and Thailand is no exception. The number of Thai youth drinking continues to rise steadily. Adolescent drinking can evoke physical, mental, social, and economic problems. Studies have found that adolescent drinking can affect both the individual (i.e. physical and mental health problems) and the society (i.e.family and community problems) where they reside. Therefore, the need to better understand factors associated with youth alcohol consumption can help develop necessary interventions to decrease drinking. The aim of this study is to determine which factors are associated with Thai student drinking.

Sample: Participants were either Thai student who had studied in grade 11 of high school or in the second year of vocational collage. A stratified random sampling technique of two states was used. The sample size for this analysis was 16,084 students.

Method: A secondary analysis of a national cross-sectional study used data from the National School Survey for Alcohol Consumption and Health Risk Behaviors of 2016. Descriptive statistics were used to explore social norms, parental and school monitoring, and drinking-related environmental risk factors. Multinomial logistic regression was used to see whether there were associations between alcohol consumption (current drinking, binge drinking, and drunkenness) and social norms, monitoring, and environmental risk factors.

Results: Students reported 25.7%, 25%, and 18.4% for current drinkers, binge drinkers, and drunken drinkers, respectively. Male students had a higher prevalence for all drinking types compared to female students. The study findings showed that factors associated with drinking for both male and female students were student GPA, type of educational institution, religion, depression, friends drinking, and living in at-risk communities. Both parental and family member drinking showed a positive significance for female students.

Conclusion: The study findings showed that multiple factors were associated with alcohol consumption among Thai students. Thus, the use of a longitudinal study design in determining the relationships between alcohol consumption (current drinking, binge drinking, and drunkenness) and student characteristics would be quite beneficial.

Comments

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