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Published on: April 28, 2022
Comparative psychometric study of a range of hazardous drinking measures administered online in a youth population
Bonnita A Thomas1, Jim McCambridge
1King's College London, National Addiction Centre, Institute of Psychiatry, De'Crespigny Park, London SE5 8AF, United Kingdom. Bonnita.Thomas@iop.kcl.ac.uk <Bonnita.Thomas@iop.kcl.ac.uk>
Aims:
To compare the psychometric performance of a range of existing alcohol measures when data are collected online with young people, and thereby to gain insights into the reliability and validity of this mode of data collection.
Method:
One hundred and sixty-seven U.K. resident young people aged 16-24 who had drunk alcohol within the past week participated in a cross-sectional psychometric study with a test-retest reliability component. Eight hazardous drinking measures were used: the alcohol use disorders identification test (AUDIT) summary instrument and dedicated assessments of consumption (timeline follow-back and diary-format recall of alcohol drunk in the last 7 days), dependence (Leeds dependence questionnaire and severity of dependence scale) and problems (Rutgers alcohol problem index, alcohol problems scale and academic role expectations and alcohol scale).
Results:
Internal consistency and test-retest correlation statistics were generally satisfactory, providing evidence of reliability. Validation data obtained in principal components analyses, investigation of the correlation matrix and in a multiple regression model of total AUDIT score were also supportive of the online use of these measures. Evidence was weakest for the alcohol problems scale.
Conclusions:
A range of hazardous drinking measures exhibit sound psychometric properties when administered online. Further comparative study of the relationships between different measures is needed.
