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Alcohol and risky behaviors
Colleen M Corte1, Marilyn Sawyer Sommers
1Department of Public Health, Mental Health, and Administrative Nursing, College of Nursing, University of Illinois at Chicago, USA.
Annual Review of Nursing Research
|December 15, 2005
Summary
This review examines risky behaviors like drinking, driving, and sex. Unconventionality and sensation seeking are linked to these behaviors, but more research is needed to confirm causality.
Area of Science:
- Behavioral Science
- Psychology
- Public Health
Background:
- Risky behaviors, including excessive alcohol consumption, impaired driving, and unsafe sexual practices, represent significant public health concerns.
- Understanding the interplay between these behaviors and their underlying risk factors is crucial for developing effective prevention strategies.
- Existing literature often examines these behaviors in isolation, necessitating a comprehensive review that considers their interrelationships.
Purpose of the Study:
- To review and critique the existing literature on the associations between risky drinking, driving, and sexual behaviors.
- To examine the role of theoretical models in understanding these behaviors.
- To identify key risk and protective factors and unresolved issues in the study of risky behaviors.
Main Methods:
- Systematic electronic literature searches were conducted across nursing, medicine, and psychology databases.
- Keywords included "alcohol and risky behavior," "risky drinking," "risky driving," "risky sex," and "sexual aggression."
- Theoretical models of risky behaviors were used as a framework for literature analysis.
Main Results:
- Sensation seeking was associated with risky drinking, driving, and sex, though causal links require further investigation.
- Unconventionality emerged as a significant contributor to risky drinking, driving, and adolescent risky sex.
- Alcohol's pharmacological effects influence risky sex, particularly in individuals conflicted about safe practices, and may contribute to sexual aggression.
- Key risk factors include high tolerance for deviance, unconventional attitudes, peer norms for deviance, and sensation seeking.
- Protective factors involve conventional attitudes and peer modeling.
Conclusions:
- Risky drinking, driving, and sexual behaviors are interconnected, influenced by individual traits like sensation seeking and unconventionality.
- Alcohol's effects on cognition and aggression, coupled with societal stereotypes, play a role in these behaviors.
- Interventions should consider a broader, theoretically informed approach addressing multiple risky behaviors and their associated factors, rather than focusing on single behaviors.