Predicting the Effects of Underage Drinking on Concomitant Alcohol Use Disorder and Poor Educational Attainment

This study examined whether and how underage drinking (UD) relates with concomitant alcohol use disorder and poor educational attainment (CAUDAPEA). A total of 39,860 participants (25-75 years old), roughly 59% of the 2010 National Survey of Drug Use and Health (NSDUH) sample, were drawn for the study. Correlation and regression analyses were used to address the research question. Demographic characteristics of respondents were analyzed using t-test or Chi-square statistics. Alpha was set at .05 to determine statistical significance. Underage drinking alone was a strong and statistically significant predictor of CAUDAPEA. The simple binary logistic regression model identified was statistically significant: (chi-square = 24.19, df =1, p < .05), (Cox and Snell R2 = 0.001), and (Nagelkerke R2 = 0.015), which suggests that using the Nagelkerke R2, the model explains roughly 1.5% of the variation in CAUDAPEA. The regression coefficient and the Wald statistic show that the effect of having underage drinking history (UDHISTORY) on CAUDAPEA is highly significant (Wald F = 14.44, df = 1, p < .05) with odds ratio = 4.86 indicating that currently legal age drinkers with UDHISTORY were about five times more likely to experience CAUDAPEA than their counterparts without UDHISTORY. When demographic variables (age, gender, race/ethnicity) were added to the model, the identified final multiple logistic regression model was statistically significant, (chi-square = 132.33, df = 10, p < .05), (Cox and Snell R2 = 0.008), and (Nagelkerke R2 = 0.079) which suggests that using the Nagelkerke R2, the model explains roughly 7.9% of the variance in CAUDAPEA, an improvement over the model with UDHISTORY alone. Results suggest different ways of looking at relationships between underage drinking, alcohol use disorder, and educational attainment. Implications for rehabilitation and prevention are discussed.   Keywords: underage drinking, alcohol use disorder, poor educational attainment, concomitance