Parents' willingness to provide alcohol and adolescents' alcohol use – Evidence from Swedish data

Abstract

The aim of the current study was to study the relationship between parents' willingness to provide various alcoholic beverages and the binge-drinking behaviour of their adolescent children. Parental willingness was reported by the child of the parent. Cross-sectional data on Swedish adolescents aged 12–18 were used for the empirical analysis (n = 2243). A bivariate probit selection model was used to analyse (a) participation in drinking and (b) binge drinking conditional on participation in drinking. The results showed that parents' willingness to provide a certain alcoholic beverage was correlated significantly and positively with the probability of their adolescent binge-drinking the same beverage. Moreover, no evidence was found for any substitution effects, i.e. that adolescents increased consumption of another alcoholic beverage when there were no willingness to provide a certain beverage by their parent. The findings have important policy implications, as no evidence was found for any substitution effects or for the hypothesis that parental willingness to provide alcohol was associated with more ‘responsible’ drinking patterns among the adolescents. The findings lend support to policies aimed at reducing the willingness of parents to provide alcohol to their adolescent children.

Keywords:

• Adolescents
• binge-drinking
• parents
• substitution effects

Acknowledgements

Financial support from the Swedish Council for Working Life and Social Research, the Swedish National Institute for Public Health, and Handelsbankens forskningsstiftelser is gratefully acknowledged.