Stress Accumulation and Substance Use isorder among Older Adults

• In Event: 067 - Section on Aging and the Life Course Refereed Roundtable Session
  In Refereed Roundtable 100min: Table 10. Stress, Mental Health, Substance Use and Problem Behaviors

Abstract

Lifetime cumulative stress has been demonstrated to influence risk of drug and alcohol use disorders but the evidence is from young age groups. Information is needed about older persons, as the baby boom generation, known for its youthful drug culture, enters old age. This study analyzes the relationship between stress accumulation and the initial onset of substance use disorders as late as the mid-fifties among older community-residing adults. The ethnically diverse sample N=1916 has a mean age of 59 (s.d. 16), and ranges from 18 to 93. Substance use and psychatric disorders are assessed with the Composite International Diagnostic Interview, which reflects DSM-IV criteria, assessed retrospectively. Disorder risk associated with individual stressful events, and that associated with accumulated events, are reported using survival analysis. Independent effects of distal and proximal stressors are found, which persist with controls for sociodemographic, mental health, and parental substance use problems. Average onset age for substance use disorders is 26 years, and persistence of substance use problems beyond age 50 is also reported.

Author

• Donald A. Lloyd, University of Southern California