Functional Limitation, Pain, and Alcohol Use: Exploring Gender Differences in the Mediating Role of Depressive...

This study considered the processes linking functional limitation and pain with depressive symptoms and two alcohol-related outcomes (past-month drinking and problematic drinking) over a 3-year period.

Data were drawn from a two-wave Miami-Dade County community study of people with physical disabilities (N = 559). Structural equation modeling was used to assess whether depressive symptoms mediated the associations among functional limitation, bodily pain, and the alcohol-related outcomes considered, and whether these associations were moderated by gender.

When the effects of the sociodemographic control variables were controlled for, depressive symptoms partly explained the effects of Wave 1 functional limitation and bodily pain on problematic drinking at Wave 2. The mediating effects of depressive symptoms on problematic drinking were significantly greater for men than for women.

The findings demonstrate clear linkages between two physical health indicators, depressive symptoms and drinking, and highlight the circumstances in which gender matters most for understanding these associations.