Laryea, Ruth

Winter, Marcia, PhD

English

VCU Scholars Compass

Virginia Commonwealth University VCU Scholars Compass Spit for Science Publications and Presentations Spit for Science: The VCU Student Survey 2020 Spiraling: Do Parents Help Lighten the Blow of Trauma Ruth Laryea Virginia Commonwealth Univeristy Marcia Winter PhD Virginia Commonwealth University Follow this and additional works at: https://scholarscompass.vcu.edu/spit_pubs  Part of the Other Mental and Social Health Commons, Psychology Commons, and the Substance Abuse and Addiction Commons  © The Author(s) Downloaded from https://scholarscompass.vcu.edu/spit_pubs/5 This Presentation is brought to you for free and open access by the Spit for Science: The VCU Student Survey at VCU Scholars Compass. It has been accepted for inclusion in Spit for Science Publications and Presentations by an authorized administrator of VCU Scholars Compass. For more information, please contact libcompass@vcu.edu. Spiraling: Do Parents Help Lighten the Blow of Trauma?Ruth Laryea¹ & Marcia Winter, Ph.D.¹Dept. of PsychologyIntroductionDrinking alcohol has been proposed as a compensatory behavior for  managing the ill effects of trauma exposure. (Vandrey et al., 2014)● Past research demonstrates an association  between exposure to stressful and potentially traumatic events (PTE) and risk for alcohol use disorder (AUD) (Boden et al., 2014)● Research with college students has identified a mediating relationship between potentially traumatic event (PTE) exposure, psychological symptomatology, namely PTSD and alcohol use disorder (AUD) (Lind et al., 2017)Research has shown that potentially traumatic event exposure elevates risk for the development of psychopathology. Previous exposure to PTEs may indicate increased frequency and quantity of alcohol consumption, trauma-related distress, and depressive and anxious symptoms. (Overstreet et al., 2017)● Furthermore, work has shown that stressful life events, especially those that are unavoidable and uncontrollable are implicated in the development of anxiety sensitivity in children and adolescents.(Grant et al., 2004) (McLaughlin & Hatzenbuehler, 2009)● Elevated anxiety sensitivity has shown to be an antecedent event associated with increased risk of the development of panic disorder and PTSD, disorders that are categorized as anxiety disorders. (Olatunji & Wolitzky-Taylor, 2009) Past research also suggests that support from a trusted adult during childhood can aid in the development of resilience and mitigate adverse effects of childhood trauma on emotional and behavioral health (Bellis et al., 2017).● Parental involvement may protect youth from the negative psychological outcomes associated with PTE exposure.● For example, parent-child closeness and healthier emotional functioning have been associated with  increased esteem and a reciprocal relationship with enhanced parent-child closeness (Boutelle et al., 2009).● It is yet to be determined, however, whether parental involvement early in life specifically moderates the relationship between potentially traumatic event exposure and the development of anxiety symptomatology. Aims and Hypotheses➢ Our current study aimed to examine whether parental involvement may partially protect youth from the impact of potentially traumatic events on risk for problematic alcohol consumption in college. ➢ It was hypothesized that:○ Experiencing traumatic events would be associated with problematic alcohol consumption in college ○ The relationship between traumatic events and increased alcohol use in college would be partially mediated by anxiety, such that experiencing traumatic events prior to college is associated with greater anxietysymptoms in college, which is then associated with increased alcohol consumption. ○ Parental involvement would buffer the effects of traumatic events on youth. Parental involvement was examined as a moderator of the link between traumatic events and anxiety such that the effect would be lessened for individuals whose parents were more involved during childhood.Participants The study drew from the university-wide, longitudinal cohort study, Spit for Science.  Data used in this study were from participants in Cohorts 1 - 3 who provided data in both the fall (time 1) and spring (time 2) of their freshman year. The resulting sample was 3,296 students (64% female and 36% male). At time 1, participants ranged in age from 18 to 25.61 (M = 18.49, SD = .45). The self-reported ethnicity of participants yielded an ethnic breakdown of 0.5% American Indian/Native Alaskan, 13.5% Asian, 19.6% Black/African American, 6.4% Hispanic/Latino, 6.3% more than one race, 0.8% Native Hawaiian/Other Pacific Islander, 0.4% unknown, and 52.6% white. ProceduresVCU freshmen were recruited via email to participate in the IRB-approved Spit for Science study in the fall of their freshman year and those who consented to participate were also invited to participate again in the spring of their freshman year. All data used in this study was self-reported at time 1 except for alcohol abuse which was reported at time 2.Results & ConclusionWorks CitedAmerican Psychiatric Association (2000). Diagnostic and statistical manual of mental disorders (4th ed., Text Revision). Washington, DC: Author.Boden JM, Fergusson DM, Horwood LJ. Associations between exposure to stressful life events and alcohol use disorder in a longitudinal birth cohort studied to age 30. Drug Alcohol Dependence 2014;142:154-160. doi:10.1016/j.drugalcdep.2014.06.010Boutelle, K., Eisenberg, M. E., Gregory, M. L., & Neumark-Sztainer, D. (2009). The reciprocal relationship between parent–child connectedness and adolescent emotional functioning over 5 years. Journal of Psychosomatic Research, 66(4), 309-316.Bucholz, K.K., Cardoret, R., Cloninger, R.C., Dinwiddie, S.H., Hesselbrock, V.M., & Nurnberger, Jr., J.I. (1994). A new, semi-structured psychiatric interview for use in genetic linkage Studies: A report on the reliability of the SSAGA. Journal of Studies on Alcohol. 55(2), 149-158.Derogatis, L. R., Lipman, R. S., and Covi, L. (1973). SCL-90: An outpatient psychiatric rating scale–preliminary report. Psychopharmacology Bulletin 9, 13–28.Dick, D.M., Nasim, A., Edwards,  A.C., Salvatore, J.E., Cho, S.B., Adkins, A., Meyers, J., Yan, J., Cooke, M., Clifford, J., Goyal, N., Halberstadt, L., Ailstock, K., Neale, Z., Opalesky, J., Hancock, L., Donovan, K.K., Sun, C., Riley, B., & Kendler, K.S. (2014).  Spit for Science:  Launching a Longitudinal Study of Genetic and Environmental Influences on Substance Use and Emotional Health at a Large US University. Front Genet., 5, eCollection 2014, Article 47.  doi: 10.3389/fgene.2014.00047.Gray, M.J., Litz, B.T.,Hsu, J.L. & Lombardo, T.W. (2004).Psychometric properties of the life events checklist. Assessment, 11, 330-341. doi: 10.1177/1073191104269954Lind, M. J., Baylor, A., Overstreet, C. M., Hawn, S. E., Rybarczyk, B. D., Kendler, K. S., Dick, D.M. & Amstadter, A. B. (2017). Relationships between potentially traumatic events, sleep disturbances, and symptoms of PTSD and alcohol use disorder in a young adult sample. Sleep medicine, 34. 141-147https://doi.org/10.1016/j.sleep.2017.02.024Hayes, A. F. (2018).  Introduction to mediation, moderation, and conditional process analysis: A regression-based approach (2nd ed.). New York: Guilford Press.McLaughlin, K. A., & Hatzenbuehler, M. L. (2009). Stressful life events, anxiety sensitivity, and internalizing symptoms in adolescents. Journal of abnormal psychology, 118(3), 659. doi:10.1037/a0016499zOlatunji, B. O., & Wolitzky-Taylor, K. B. (2009). Anxiety sensitivity and the anxiety disorders: A meta-analytic review and synthesis. Psychological Bulletin, 135(6), 974–999. https://doi.org/10.1037/a0017428Overstreet, C., Berenz, E. C., Kendler, K. S., Dick, D. M., & Amstadter, A. B. (2017). Predictors and mental health outcomes of potentially traumatic event exposure. Psychiatry research, 247, 296-304.Steinberg, L., Lamborn, S.D., Dornbusch, S.M. & Darling, N. (1992). Impact of parenting practices on adolescent achievement: Authoritative parenting, school  involvement, and encouragement to succeed. Child Development, 63, 1266-1281.Vandrey, R., Babson, K.A., Herrmann, E.S., & Bonn-Miller, M.O. (2014) Interactions between disordered sleep, post-traumatic stress disorder, and substance use disorders, International Review of Psychiatry, 26:2, 237-247, DOI: 10.3109/09540261.2014.901300Acknowledgements● This research was supported by the National Institute On Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism of the National Institutes of Health under Award Number R25AA027402.The content is solely the responsibility of the author(s) and does not necessarily represent the official views of the National Institutes of Health.● Spit for Science has been supported by Virginia Commonwealth University, P20 AA017828, R37AA011408, K02AA018755, and P50 AA022537 from the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism, and UL1RR031990 from the National Center for Research Resources and National Institutes of Health Roadmap for Medical Research. We would like to thank the Spit for Science participants for making this study a success, as well as the many University faculty, students, and staff who contributed to the design and implementation of the project.MethodologyConstruct Measure Description Traumatic ExperiencesLife Experiences Checklist (Gray et al., 2004)Sum of 5 items rated on a binary (Yes/No) scale. Items specify incidents experienced prior to matriculation.  Anxiety SymptomsAnxiety scale of the Symptom Checklist-90 (SLC-90)(Derogatis & Cleary, 1977)Sum of four items each rated on a scale of 1 – 5. Total anxiety score was the sum of the scores of the four items. Alcohol AbuseAlcohol abuse symptoms(American Psychiatric Association, 2000)Sum of items measuring drinking behavior Family InvolvementFamily Involvement scale of the Impact of Parenting Practices on Adolescent Achievement Study (Steinberg et al., 1992)Sum of three items rated from 1-4 and reverse scored. Scores may range from (3-12)Potential CovariatesDemographics o Participant age and gender (female or male)o Female/mother & male/father education; 0 = less than HS, 1 = HS degree or certified training, 2 = higher educationFreshman with a history of trauma exposure may be at higher risk for anxiety and, in turn, alcohol abuse-- Although family involvement did not moderate the relationship between potential traumatic event exposure , it may be that the measure of parental involvement used in this study mainly focused on scholastic achievement. In the future, we may need to measure emotional support Data analysis was conducted in SPSS 26.0 (IBM, 2019). Prior to testing the proposed model, the data were cleaned and main variables were checked; no skew or kurtosis were found. Model 7 of the Process 3.5 macro for SPSS (Hayes, 2018) was used to test the main proposed model including direct and indirect pathways as well as family involvement as a moderator on the X to M (predictor to mediator) path. Based on the pattern of correlations, participant gender, mother/female education, and father/male education were included as covariates. Predictors were mean centered prior to the construction of products. Using 5000 bootstraps with replacement, the bias corrected 95% confidence intervals was used to determine the presence of significant direct and indirect pathways: If the confidence interval yielded for the indirect path did not contain zero, the indirect path between ACEs and alcohol use through anxiety symptoms was considered statistically significant. Moderation was considered present if the confidence interval for the index of moderated mediation did not contain zero. ● The overall model was significant, [R = .1910, R2 = .0365 F (5, 2934) = 22.21, p < .001] but results did not support the moderated mediator model (β = -.0010, LLCI = -.0032, +ULCI = .0009); the interaction of traumatic events and family involvement was not significantly associated with anxiety (β = -.027, t = -1.251, p = .21). ● Results supported both the direct (β = .116, LLCI = .0847, ULCI = .1474) and indirect/mediational ( β = .015, LLCI = .0089, ULCI = .0222) paths from traumatic events to alcohol abuse. See Figure 2.Table 1. Descriptive Statistics and Correlations for Study VariablesBivariate correlations were run to examine intercorrelations and test for significant associations between study variables & potential covariates.a1 = female and 2 = male. b1 = less than high school, 2 = high school graduate, and 3 = education beyond high school.*p < .05, **p < .01.

Spiraling: Do Parents Help Lighten the Blow of Trauma

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Spiraling: Do Parents Help Lighten the Blow of Trauma

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