Short communicationProblematic alcohol and cannabis use among young adults: The roles of depression and discomfort and distress tolerance
Section snippets
Participants
The present sample consisted of 265 psychology undergraduates. The sample was predominantly Caucasian (78.1%) and female (62.3%) with a mean age of 18.7 (SD = 1.2). Nearly 74% reported consuming alcohol more than once in the past month and 48.4% reported five or more drinks per session. About 60% reported ever using cannabis, 31.3% reported past-month cannabis use and 8.2% reported daily cannabis use.
Measures
Participants provided written informed consent and completed self-report measures in a group
Results
Using a probability factor of .025 to control for Type I error, we found that depression was related to alcohol problems (r = .27, p < .01), cannabis problems (r = .26, p < .01), and distress intolerance (r = − .53, p < .01) but was unrelated to alcohol quantity, alcohol and cannabis frequency, and discomfort intolerance (r's < .10, p's > .025). Discomfort intolerance was related to decreased distress tolerance (r = − .16, p < .025) and decreased cannabis frequency (r = − .23, p < .01). Distress tolerance was related to
Discussion
The first goal of the present study was to investigate whether discomfort intolerance and distress intolerance were linked to problematic alcohol and cannabis use. Consistent with past work (e.g., Simons & Gaher, 2005), distress intolerance was related to alcohol and cannabis problems, increased alcohol quantity, and increased cannabis use frequency. Together, these data suggest that individuals with low distress tolerance use substances to regulate emotions which is a cause for concern given
Acknowledgement
This research was supported in part by a National Research Service Award from the National Institute of Drug Abuse (F31 DA12457-01) awarded to Julia D. Buckner.
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