The Effect of Parental Alcohol Use on Alcohol Use in Dutch Adolescents: The Influence of Parental Monitoring

Abstract

The present study investigated to what extent parental monitoring influences the relationship between parental alcohol use and adolescent alcohol use and distinguished between effects of maternal and paternal alcohol use as well as between effects of maternal and paternal monitoring. This is the first study to investigate the effect of parental monitoring on the relationship between parental and adolescent alcohol use. Additionally, previous studies did not often distinguish between maternal and paternal monitoring. This study used longitudinal data from the Tracking Adolescents’ Individual Lives Survey (TRAILS) (N=814). The results showed a significant positive relationship between maternal and adolescent alcohol use. There was no significant relationship found between paternal and adolescent alcohol use. Furthermore, parental monitoring did not influence the relationship between parental and adolescent alcohol use. In order to target interventions specifically, it is important to further investigate which factors can weaken the relationship between maternal and adolescent alcohol use in particular, as maternal alcohol use was found to be the strongest predictor of adolescent alcohol use according to the current study.