Multilevel longitudinal relations among impulsive traits, positive expectancies, and binge drinking from late adolescence to adulthood: A developmental test of acquired preparedness

Abstract

Background:The Acquired Preparedness Model (APM) posits that highly impulsive individuals develop stronger positive alcohol expectancies, which in turn predicts heavier drinking. However, most acquired preparedness studies have focused solely on between-person relations, despite the theory suggesting that there are potential developmental-specific within-person relations. Thus, the current study tested the APM from late adolescence into adulthood, while disaggregating within-from between-person relations.Methods: Data come from a multigenerational study of familial alcohol use disorder (N=653) spanning three waves 5 years apart. Participants reported their lack of conscientiousness, sensation seeking, positive alcohol expectancies, and binge drinking at each wave. First, missing data techniques were used to create a "ghost timepoint," allowing the specification of four developmental-specific timepoints representing late adolescence (age 18 to 20), emerging adulthood (age 21 to 25), young adulthood (age 26 to 29), and adulthood (age 30 to 39). Second, a Random-Intercept Cross-Lagged Panel Model tested between-person and within-person relations among variables.Results: At the between-person level, lower conscientiousness and sensation seeking were correlated with higher positive expectancies, and positive expectancies were correlated with more binge drinking. There were no within-person prospective relations among conscientiousness, sensation seeking, and positive expectancies.However, within-person increases in lack of conscientiousness during late adolescence predicted within-person increases in emerging adult binge drinking, and withinperson increases in late adolescent and emerging adult binge drinking predicted within-person increases in lack of conscientiousness during emerging and young adulthood, respectively. Similarly, within-person increases in late adolescent and young adult sensation seeking predicted within-person increases in binge drinking during emerging adulthood and adulthood, respectively. Binge drinking did not reciprocally predict sensation seeking.Conclusions: Findings suggest that acquired preparedness effects may be between persons rather than within persons. However, several within-person developmentalspecific relations among conscientiousness, sensation seeking, and binge drinking How to cite this article:

Uncontrolled eating and sensation-seeking partially explain the prediction of future binge drinking from adolescent brain structure

“…This suggests that binge drinking shares common neural precursors with other binge behaviors exhibited in young adulthood and that these neural risk factors measured during adolescence coincide with sensation seeking. One possible explanation is that particularly slow or late onset of cortical maturation predisposes to impulsivity-related characteristics and behaviors, specifically to high sensation-seeking during adolescence ( Wasserman et al, 2020 ) and to binge drinking and eating during young adulthood ( Bø et al, 2016 , Escrivá-Martínez et al, 2020 ). These relationships could inform clinical studies to test early interventions targeting sensation-seeking in adolescents with neural risk factors for future heavy binge drinking and binge eating.…”