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Gender, Acculturation and Alcohol Use among Latina/o Adolescents: A Multi-Ethnic Comparison

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Abstract

This is the first study to examine the relationship between acculturation and alcohol use by gender and ethnicity using a nationally representative sample of Hispanic and non-Hispanic white adolescents. Specifically, we use data from the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health (Add Health) to explore alcohol use and binge drinking for a sample that includes 6792 non-Hispanic whites, 910 Mexican Americans, 290 Cuban Americans, and 336 Puerto Ricans. Bivariate results reveal significant gender differences in alcohol use among first generation Mexican American, first generation Puerto Rican, and second generation Cuban American adolescents. In addition, these results indicate binge drinking differs significantly by gender among first generation Mexican American, first generation Cuban American, third plus generation Puerto Rican, and third plus generation non-Hispanic white adolescents. Multivariate logistic regression reveals that gender also moderates the effect of acculturation as well as ethnicity on alcohol use and abuse. Among both males and females, first generation immigrants are significantly less likely than third plus generation immigrants to use alcohol and binge drink while selective acculturation significantly reduces the odds of both behaviors. However, the effects of immigrant generation and selective acculturation on binge drinking are larger for females. Further, the trajectories that alcohol use and binge drinking follow with acculturation differ significantly by gender and ethnicity. These results reaffirm the need to further develop theoretical models and intervention strategies that are both gender-specific and culturally-specific, targeting high risk groups in particular in these efforts.

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Notes

  1. The conceptualization and measurement of acculturation remains subject to debate. Scholars agree that acculturation is a multidimensional and complex process of adaptation to a host society and, thus, have developed a wide range of measures to tap these complexities. Language use and nativity/generational status represent those measures that are most widely used in studies focusing on alcohol use and abuse. These measures as well as others are intended to capture the broader processes of cultural and structural assimilation many scholars emphasize in their work on immigrants [22].

  2. Gordon’s analyses focused on the positive consequences of acculturation and emphasized the role of assimilation/acculturation in the upward mobility that many immigrants have historically secured in the United States. While Gordon did not address negative consequences directly, his perspective does not seem to preclude the possibility that acculturation could result in negative behaviors/outcomes to the extent that these are elements of the dominant culture.

  3. More detailed documentation on the Add Health design can be found in Chantala [50].

  4. Results of alternative analyses using imputation methods (mean or statistical imputation) resulted in similar findings.

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Acknowledgements

Financial assistance for this study was provided by the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism (grant number R01 AA13167) and the National Institute on Drug Abuse (grant number R01 DA018645-01A1). We gratefully acknowledge Michael French and members of the Health Economics Research Group (HERG) for their research suggestions. The authors are entirely responsible for the research and results reported in this paper, and their position or opinions do not necessarily represent those of the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism. This research uses data from Add Health, a program project designed by J. Richard Udry, Peter S. Bearman, and Kathleen Mullan Harris, and funded by a grant P01-HD31921 from the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development, with cooperative funding from 17 other agencies. Special acknowledgment is due Ronald R. Rindfuss and Barbara Entwisle for assistance in the original design.

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  1. Department of Sociology, Wake Forest University, P.O. Box 7808, Winston-Salem, NC, 27109, USA

    Ana-María González Wahl

  2. Department of Sociology, Montana State University, Bozeman, MT, USA

    Tamela McNulty Eitle

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Correspondence to Ana-María González Wahl.

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Wahl, AM.G., Eitle, T.M. Gender, Acculturation and Alcohol Use among Latina/o Adolescents: A Multi-Ethnic Comparison. J Immigrant Minority Health 12, 153–165 (2010). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10903-008-9179-6

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