Original article
Is Commercial Alcohol Availability Related to Adolescent Alcohol Sources and Alcohol Use? Findings from a Multi-Level Study

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Abstract

Purpose

To examine whether compliance with underage sales laws by licensed retail establishments is related to underage use of commercial and social alcohol sources, perceived ease of obtaining alcohol, and alcohol use.

Methods

In 2005, alcohol purchase surveys were conducted at 403 off-premise licensed retail establishments in 43 Oregon school districts. A survey also was administered to 3,332 11th graders in the districts. Multi-level logistic regression analyses were used to examine relationships between the school district-level alcohol sales rate and students’ use of commercial and social alcohol sources, perceived ease of obtaining alcohol, past-30-day alcohol use, and heavy drinking.

Results

The school district-level alcohol sales rate was positively related to students’ use of commercial alcohol sources and perceived alcohol availability, but was not directly associated with use of social alcohol sources and drinking behaviors. Additional analyses indicated stronger associations between drinking behaviors and use of social alcohol sources relative to other predictors. These analyses also provided support for an indirect association between the school district-level alcohol sales rate and alcohol use behaviors.

Conclusions

Compliance with underage alcohol sales laws by licensed retail establishments may affect underage alcohol use indirectly, through its effect on underage use of commercial alcohol sources and perceived ease of obtaining alcohol. However, use of social alcohol sources is more strongly related to underage drinking than use of commercial alcohol sources and perceived ease of obtaining alcohol.

Section snippets

Student survey sample

Survey data were collected anonymously from 11th graders who participated in the Oregon Healthy Teens Survey (OHT) [13] in 43 Oregon school districts in the spring of 2005. These school districts are part of an ongoing study on the effects of community-based strategies that are designed to reduce underage drinking. The school districts were selected based on their prior and ongoing use of the OHT, their geographic representation of different Oregon regions, and their geographic separation to

Results

Sample characteristics are provided in Table 1 by category of the school district alcohol sales rate. As noted previously, the majority of students did not report any use of commercial or social alcohol sources, alcohol use, or heavy drinking in the past 30 days. However, more than half of the students thought alcohol would be very easy to obtain. Past-30-day use of commercial alcohol sources was more prevalent among districts in the middle (20–38%) category than districts in the lowest (0–17%)

Discussion

Although reducing the commercial availability of alcohol to underage youth is considered an important component of a comprehensive prevention strategy [1], [16], research on the relationship between commercial alcohol availability and underage drinking is limited. In contrast to previous studies [12], our findings indicate that commercial alcohol availability is not directly related to underage alcohol use or heavy episodic drinking, but may have an indirect effect through underage use of

Acknowledgment

This study was funded by a grant from the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism (NIAAA Grant No. R01 AA014958).

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