The influence of sport involvement on adolescents’ alcohol use.

Abstract

This study investigated the influence of sport involvement (total sport memberships and frequency of sport activities) on weekly alcohol use among adolescents and to what extent this relationship is influenced by doing sport activities with parents and the availability of alcohol in sport canteens. In the literature, a lot of inconsistency for those relationships are reported. Cross-sectional and longitudinal data (T1 & T2) of an ongoing Dutch study were used. In total 1365 participants (M age 14.14, SD 1.03) were included. To test the influence of sport involvement on weekly alcohol use among adolescents and the role of the moderators, multiple linear regression analyses were conducted cross-sectionally and longitudinally. More total sport memberships significantly predicted more alcohol use among adolescents. This effect was particularly found for adolescents who did more sport activities with their parents. The influence of frequency of sport activities on weekly drinking was only found for adolescents who perceived alcohol more available in sport canteens. More research is necessary to get a better understanding of the influence of sport involvement on the drinking behaviour of adolescents.