Parents Allowing Adolescents to Drink Alcohol: Increases during the COVID-19 Pandemic Shutdown

• In Event: Poster Session 10
  In Poster Session: PS 10 Topic - Solicited Content: COVID-19 Related

Abstract

Prior to the pandemic, parents held ambiguous views about benefits and harms of alcohol. Non-abstainers tend to view light to moderate alcohol use as a mostly benign source of pleasure and relaxation for adults (Watson et al., 2020). Many but not all parents, however, believe that delaying drinking is safer for adolescents, partly due to acute risks such as injury, assault, or risky sex (Watson et al., 2020). Nonetheless, some parents allow adolescents to drink; varied reasons have been proposed but are not well understood (Brook et al., 2020; Fegert et al., 2020; Maggs, 2020).
This paper tested the proposition that stay-at-home orders increased the likelihood of parents allowing adolescents to drink, based on prior conceptual and empirical work (e.g., Dumas et al., 2020; Maggs et al., 2018; Maggs, 2020). Several rationales underlaid this prediction: (1) With drinking restricted to homes, opportunities to share with children would increase; (2) With increased stress, some parents would drink more often; (3) Normal social activities were curtailed, leaving youth isolated and bored; (4) Parents had limited options for normal family treats or privileges; (5) Parents might fear acute risks of adolescent alcohol use less if drinking occurred at home. Given these conceptual and empirical bases, we hypothesized that the proportion of parents who allowed adolescents to drink would increase during the shutdown, adjusting for pre-pandemic factors previously shown to predict greater parental alcohol permissibility.
Data came from an ongoing longitudinal study. Annual survey data for Time 1 were collected between March 2019 and March 2020 and a special assessment of individual and family experiences during the pandemic was conducted between May 1, 2020 and June 15, 2020. 456 (85% mothers; M = 45.15 [SD = 5.37] years old) reported on their parenting practices and family relationship experiences with two adolescent-aged children. Older siblings (51% female) averaged 15.67 (SD = .68) years old, and younger siblings (48% female) averaged 13.14 (SD = 1.11) years. Parents’ indicated whether they allowed each of the siblings to drink alcoholic beverages at family meals using an item adapted from Abar et al. (2009). Parents reported their demographic characteristics and own alcohol use before and during the pandemic using recommended items (NIAAA, 2003).
Results indicated a significant increase in the percentage of parents who allowed older and younger siblings to drink during the pandemic. Specifically, no (0% of) parents reported allowing their adolescents to drink alcohol at home at Time 1 and 15% reported allowing them to drink at home during the pandemic. Logistic regression models indicated that non-abstaining parents of White children who had previously consumed alcohol were more likely to permit adolescent drinking during the pandemic (see Table 1). These effects were independent of socioeconomic status and parent and child gender.
Discussion will focus on the factors associated with the change toward allowing adolescent drinking at home, a documented risk factor for faster escalation to heavy drinking outside the home (Staff & Maggs, 2020), in the broader context of longer-term implications of other pandemic-related parenting changes.

Authors

• Jenna Cassinat, Utah State University
  Presenting Author

• Jennifer L Maggs, Pennsylvania State University
  Non-Presenting Author

• Shawn D Whiteman, Utah State University
  Non-Presenting Author

• Brian C Kelly, Purdue University, West Lafayette
  Non-Presenting Author

• Sarah Mustillo, University of Nortre Dame
  Non-Presenting Author