Psychosocial Maturity and Alcohol Outcomes: The Mediating role of Alcohol Protective Behavioral Strategies

<p>The present study evaluated the mediating role of alcohol protective behavioral strategies on the relationship between temperance, responsibility, perspective (i.e., the facets of psychosocial maturity) and alcohol use outcomes. Potential invariant paths among graduate and undergraduate students were also explored. All participants were undergraduate and graduate students at the University of Southern Mississippi aged 18 to 25. Participants reported demographic information and completed measures of temperance, responsibility, perspective, alcohol use, and alcohol consequences. Results indicated the full mediation model showed poor fit the data; greater temperance predicted greater alcohol protective behavioral strategy use, greater responsibility and perspective predicted less alcohol problems, and greater alcohol protective behavioral strategies use predicted less alcohol use and consequences. Invariance testing revealed variant model paths between graduate and undergraduate students, such that greater perspective predicted greater alcohol protective behavioral strategy use only among graduate students. For undergraduates only, greater responsibility was predictive of greater alcohol protective behavioral strategy use. While alcohol protective behavioral strategies predicted less alcohol use and fewer consequences for both academic classes, this relationship was stronger among undergraduate students. Examining the factors of psychosocial maturity as they relate to the subtypes of alcohol protective behavioral strategies may provide more informative results. Additionally, the measurement selection may be impact results. Specifically, the lack of a unified measure of psychosocial maturity could influence which relationships emerged. Further, the measures used were not normed for graduate students, potentially altering the results found.</p>

Level thesis:degree_level

Masters Thesis

Year dc:date.available

2022

Author dc:creator

• Hoover, Skyler

Contributors dc:contributor

• Michael Madson, PhD
• Bonnie Nicholson, PhD
• Richard Mohn, PhD

• Protective behavioral strategies
• psychosocial maturity
• alcohol consumption
• alcohol related negative consequences
• graduate students
• alcohol use behaviors

Repository record dc:identifier

https://aquila.usm.edu/masters_theses/912

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:aquila.usm.edu:masters_theses-1975