This study investigated the effects of life events and sensation seeking on drinking motives and drinking-related problems. Most of drinking studies have reported that only negative life events are correlated with drinking problems but positive ones a...
This study investigated the effects of life events and sensation seeking on drinking motives and drinking-related problems. Most of drinking studies have reported that only negative life events are correlated with drinking problems but positive ones are not. Few studies have tried to assess the relationship between both positive and negative life events and drinking-related problems. In this study, life events contained both positive and negative life events.
Subjects for the study consisted of 178(139 men, 39 women, aged 19-28 with Mean of 23.70 and Standard Deviation of 2.11) undergraduate students. They completed Hassle Scale, Uplift Scale, Sensation Seeking Scale, Drinking Motives Scale, Drinking Problem Scale and Quantity of Alcohol Use. The data were analysed by the SPSS/PC+ Package. The employed statistical methods were t-test, 2-way ANOVA, and stepwise regression analysis.
Results were as follows. First, the subjects in high positive life experiences used alcohol for social reason, compared with the subjects in low positive life experiences. the subjects with high negative life experiences used alcohol for coping reason, compared with the subjects in low negative life experiences. Those who experienced both high positive and negative life-events suffered from more drinking-related problems, compared with subjects who experienced low positive and negative life-events.
Second, the high sensation seekers were motivated toward higher levels of social drinking and experienced more drinking problems than the low sensation seekers. the high sensation seekers with high positive life experiences were found to drink more often and to suffer from greater drinking problems than low sensation seekers in high positive life experience condition. Conversely, in low positive life experiences condition, sensation seeking was not different in quantity of alcohol use.
Finally, Stepwise regression analyses indicated that only sensation seeking is the significant predictor of quantity of alcohol use. sensation seeking and positive life experiences are significant predictors of drinking-related problem. the results suggested that positive life-events is more significant predictor of drinking-related problem than negative life events.
Consequently, the results suggested that sensation seeking in both positive and negative life events condition is risk factor for higher levels of problem drinking. This is especially so for sensation seekers with high positive life experiences. The present findings suggest that psychological intervention for problem drinking may need to control the positive life events of sensation seekers. More implications and future directions of this research were also discussed.