The Association Between Onset Age of Social Anxiety and Drinking Habits and Alcohol Consumed per Session Among United States Adult Drinkers

Live Poster Session: https://wesleyan.zoom.us/j/99274869988

Abstract: Within the United States most Americans partake in alcohol consumption at least once in their life and 6.7% of them develop alcohol use disorder. Previous research indicates that there exists careful interplay between an individual having social anxiety disorder (SAD) and being more susceptible to receiving a diagnosis of alcohol use disorder (AUD). Although we know this association exists, current research does not take into account how SAD’s impact on an individual’s life is both highly personalized and context-dependent. This research seeks to investigate an essential aspect of social anxiety, age of onset of social anxiety, and its association with amount of alcohol consumption, which serves as a risk factor in developing AUD. I examined data from the 2012 National Epidemiologic Survey on Alcohol and Related Conditions-III (NESARCIII) to answer the following questions, 1: Is there an association between onset age of social anxiety and alcohol consumed per session for adult drinkers in the United States? 2: Does this association still hold when controlling for covariates? Statistical analysis revealed a significant association between age of onset of social anxiety and amount of alcohol consumed on average per session, where individuals with social anxiety onset in adolescence consumed more drinks on average (Mean=2.79, sd=4.03) per session than those with social anxiety onset in adulthood (Mean=2.45, sd=2.50) (F(2,3255)=3.261, p=.0385). Future work should look at other personalized measures of SAD as it relates to the development of AUD to strengthen our understanding of this relationship as a whole.

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