Examination of a novel measure of trauma‐related drinking to cope

Abstract

Objectives The present study sought to fill a gap in the current literature by developing a concise self‐report questionnaire assessing drinking motives specific to coping with symptoms of posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD). This new four‐item questionnaire is called the Trauma Related Drinking questionnaire (TRD). Method Using structural equation modeling, the latent structure of the TRD items and how they relate to other variables of interest were explored among a sample of 1,896 college undergraduates from a large public university. Results Broadly, we found evidence to suggest that TRD is a more specific measure of drinking to cope motives compared to the commonly used Drinking Motives Questionnaire coping subscale. Additionally, findings demonstrate support for the external validation of TRD, both with regard to PTSD and alcohol consumption and related problems. Conclusions Results support the use of TRD in future self‐medication research and as a clinically useful screening tool.

Posttraumatic stress disorder, drinking to cope, and harmful alcohol use: A multivariate meta-analysis of the self-medication hypothesis.

“…These results align with findings from a number of studies that have also found that coping-related drinking mediated the relation between PTSD and a variety of alcohol use outcomes (e.g., Aarstad-Martin & Boyraz, 2017; Hawn, Bountress, et al, 2020; McDevitt-Murphy et al, 2017). Consistent with the self-medication hypothesis, the findings from this study continue to underline the importance of coping motives as a significant and powerful influence in the PTSD and harmful alcohol use relationship.…”

“…Among veterans, coping motives have been shown to mediate the relation between PTSD and alcohol consequences (Miller et al, 2017), hazardous drinking (McDevitt-Murphy et al, 2017), alcohol consumption, frequency of use, and heavy drinking (McCabe et al, 2019). In college student samples, coping motives also mediated the relation between PTSD and risky drinking (Aarstad-Martin & Boyraz, 2017) and between alcohol use and problems (Hawn, Bountress, et al, 2020). Additionally, Hawn, Bountress, et al (2020) found that a more specific measure of “trauma-related drinking to cope” partially mediated the relation between PTSD and alcohol use problems among college students.…”

“…This measure assesses the desire to drink in response to four PTSD symptom clusters. Psychometric research on the Trauma-Related Drinking Questionnaire suggests that it is a more specific measure than the DMQ Coping subscale which focuses on depression and anxiety more generally (Hawn, Aggen, et al, 2020).…”

Trauma-related drinking to cope: A novel approach to the self-medication model.

“…Correlational analyses and descriptive statistics are provided in Table 1. Interpretation of sample means as well as differences in the distribution of TRD and other variables among individuals exceeding and not exceeding the PCL-5 and AUDIT cutoff scores are provided in the TRD psychometric article (Hawn et al, 2020). As hypothesized, all constructs included in the full model were significantly associated with one another.…”

“…Cronbach’s alpha calculated from the LEAU sample suggested that the TRD items demonstrated good internal consistency (.88). The psychometric properties of TRD, as well as detailed information about the wording of the four TRD items and the response scale used, have been reported on in detail elsewhere (Hawn, Aggen, Cusack, et al, 2020). Response items from the TRD measure were summed to create a continuous score.…”