Drinking motives among college student-athletes

ABSTRACT

Research has shown that college student-athletes participate in higher alcohol consumption (frequency and quantity) compared to non-athletes. Some common reasons to help explain these drinking patterns include drinking to cope, drinking to conform or fit in, drinking for social reasons, drinking to enhancement to a positive mood and drinking among fraternities and sororities. We hypothesized that males would have a higher Total AUDIT score, and there would be gender differences among the drinking motives. A cross-sectional sampling method was used to collect data (DMQ-R SF and AUDIT) from student-athletes (N = 225, male = 92, female = 133) who engaged in alcohol consumption behavior. No gender differences for Total AUDIT score were detected at the p < .05 significance level. Regression analyses found the ‘coping’ motive as a significant predictor of Total AUDIT and Hazardous Drinking for both genders combined. When genders were modelled separately, ‘coping’ was again a significant predictor, with the addition of ‘social’ and ‘enhancement’ motives for females on Total AUDIT score. The use of DMQ-R SF and AUDIT instruments can provide information to guide health promotion practitioners during alcohol intervention design. Results from this study indicate that ‘coping’ information should be incorporated into the messaging to assist with managing progression to hazardous drinking among student-athletes. In addition, the identification of ‘social’ and ‘enhancement’ motives among females only supports a need to provide gender-specific messaging in alcohol consumption interventions when differences are identified.

KEYWORDS:

• Binge drinking
• college students
• athletes

Acknowledgments

The authors would like to thank the Athletics Department and all the student-athletes who participated in this study. They also appreciate the efforts of Ms. Shakita Jenkins and Ms. Jacqueline Perez for their assistance with data collection.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.