Date of Award

Summer 6-2022

Degree Type

Masters Thesis

School

Psychology

Committee Chair

Michael Madson, PhD

Committee Chair School

Psychology

Committee Member 2

Bonnie Nicholson, PhD

Committee Member 2 School

Psychology

Committee Member 3

Richard Mohn, PhD

Committee Member 3 School

Education

Abstract

The present study evaluated the mediating role of alcohol protective behavioral strategies on the relationship between temperance, responsibility, perspective (i.e., the facets of psychosocial maturity) and alcohol use outcomes. Potential invariant paths among graduate and undergraduate students were also explored. All participants were undergraduate and graduate students at the University of Southern Mississippi aged 18 to 25. Participants reported demographic information and completed measures of temperance, responsibility, perspective, alcohol use, and alcohol consequences. Results indicated the full mediation model showed poor fit the data; greater temperance predicted greater alcohol protective behavioral strategy use, greater responsibility and perspective predicted less alcohol problems, and greater alcohol protective behavioral strategies use predicted less alcohol use and consequences. Invariance testing revealed variant model paths between graduate and undergraduate students, such that greater perspective predicted greater alcohol protective behavioral strategy use only among graduate students. For undergraduates only, greater responsibility was predictive of greater alcohol protective behavioral strategy use. While alcohol protective behavioral strategies predicted less alcohol use and fewer consequences for both academic classes, this relationship was stronger among undergraduate students. Examining the factors of psychosocial maturity as they relate to the subtypes of alcohol protective behavioral strategies may provide more informative results. Additionally, the measurement selection may be impact results. Specifically, the lack of a unified measure of psychosocial maturity could influence which relationships emerged. Further, the measures used were not normed for graduate students, potentially altering the results found.

ORCID ID

0000-0002-5590-5048

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