The Association of Alcohol Use and Child-to-Parent Violence in Mexican Adolescents

Abstract

Background: Addictions can modify the dynamics, communication, and establishment of assertive relationships in the family nucleus, situations that can cause different types of family violence. A phenomenon of special interest is child-to-parent violence or children’s violence toward their parents. This type of violence can be exercised physically (hitting, kicking, shoving), verbally (shouting, blackmailing and insulting) and economically (using a card, stealing money or belongings from the parents). Although is generally supported that child-to-parent violence may be associated with alcohol-induced aggressiveness and lack of control, there is less evidence of a possible differentiation regarding the sex of the parents. Objective: Analyze the relationship and effect of alcohol on child-to-parent violence according to the parents’ sex. Methods: This was a predictive study of 265 adolescents between 12 and 19 years of age. Data were collected from social networks using two self-applied instruments (the Alcohol Use Disorders Identification Test and the Conflict Tactics Scale: Parent-Child Version) programmed with the Survey Monkey® digital platform. Results: Of the adolescents studied, 66.8% had consumed alcohol at some time in their lives; of these, 6.6% had harmful consumption. A positive relationship was found between alcohol involvement scores and economic violence toward the mother and father. The former was supported by regression models where alcohol involvement predicted child-to-parent economic violence directed toward mothers and fathers. Conclusions: It is important to develop activities to prevent alcohol consumption as a risk factor for violence and to promote family integration in adolescents and their families.

Keywords:

• Alcohol consumption
• adolescent
• family violence

Acknowledgments

We thank the Mexican National Council of Science and Technology (Consejo Nacional de Ciencia y Tecnología, CONACyT) and the Universidad Autónoma de Sinaloa for their support.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Funding

The author(s) reported there is no funding associated with the work featured in this article.