Perceived-Benefit-of-Drinking Scale: approach to screening for adolescent alcohol abuse

An index that measures adolescents' perceived benefits of drinking, the self-administered Perceived-Benefit-of-Drinking Scale, has been tested on a high school population. Results indicate that the instrument is practical and that it generates a scalable, reliable, and valid measure of reasons for drinking. The scale's strong relationship with other drinking behavior indicators makes it a potentially useful clinical screening device because it can serve as a proxy measure to assess the drinking behaviors of adolescents.