Drinking over the Life Course Within Gender and Ethnic Groups: a Hyperparametric Analysis

Objective: This study examines drinking patterns over the life course among males and females and among three ethnic groups (whites, blacks and Hispanics) in order to compare gender group and ethnic group differences in alcohol use as a continuous function of age.

Method: Data are from a general population sample of 13,553 respondents aged 12 to 80 interviewed by telephone in 20 urban areas of the United States. Drinking measures include total consumption, drinking participation, drinking frequency and average drinks per occasion.

Results: In the total sample over age cohorts, total consumption, participation and average drinks per occasion rose rapidly before age 21, peaked in young adulthood and declined gradually thereafter. Drinking frequency rose rapidly before age 21, but generally showed no decline thereafter. As expected, compared to women, men consumed more total alcohol, were more likely to participate in drinking, drank more often and drank more per occasion. Men did not differ from women in the age at which peak drinking occurred. Relationships of drinking to ethnicity were more complex. Although white total consumption exceeded that of blacks and Hispanics over the entire life course, the other drinking measures involved interactions in which white participation and frequency exceeded that of blacks and Hispanics in later adulthood, but black and Hispanic average drinks per occasion exceeded that of whites in later adulthood.

Conclusions: Differences in drinking patterns over the life course among gender groups and ethnic groups are largely a result of differences in rates of change over age cohorts in alcohol use, both in rates of increase in youth and of decrease thereafter.