Coulter RWS, Jun HJ, Truong N, Mair C, Markovic N, Friedman MR, Silvestre AJ, Stall R, Corliss HL. Drug Alcohol Depend. 2019; 205: e107643.
Affiliation
Division of Health Promotion and Behavioral Science, Graduate School of Public Health, San Diego State University, 9245 Sky Park Court, Suite 100, San Diego, CA, 92123 USA; Channing Division of Network Medicine, Brigham and Women's Hospital, 181 Longwood Avenue, Boston, MA, 02115, USA.
BACKGROUND: We investigated sexual-orientation differences in typologies of self-reported familial and non-familial warmth in childhood (before age 11) and adolescence (ages 11-17); and tested whether warmth explained sexual minority emerging adults' (ages 18-25) heightened odds of having heavier alcohol use trajectories (AUTs) and heightened risk for past-year alcohol use disorder (AUD) compared to completely heterosexuals.
METHODS: Using self-reported data from the U.S.-based Growing Up Today Study cohort, latent class analyses identified typologies of familial and non-familial warmth during childhood and adolescence. Multivariable regression models tested our objectives.
RESULTS: Six warmth classes emerged, including: High-High (i.e., high familial and high non-familial warmth, respectively); High-Moderate; Moderate-Moderate; Moderate-Occasional; Occasional-Occasional; and Low-Low. Among women, sexual minorities had higher odds than completely heterosexuals of being in the Moderate-Moderate, Moderate-Occasional, and Occasional-Occasional versus the High-High warmth class. There were not significant associations between sexual orientation and warmth classes for men. Lower warmth classes were generally associated with greater past-year AUD, and mediated heightened disparities in AUD for sexual minority women versus completely heterosexual women (4.3% mediated), but not among men. Warmth classes were generally unassociated with AUTs, and did not mediate sexual-orientation differences in AUTs.
CONCLUSIONS: Lower warmth was associated with greater alcohol-related problems, but not alcohol use itself. Warmth explained a small proportion of AUD disparities for sexual minority women-but not for men.