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Consistency of Drinker Status Over Time: Drinking Patterns of Ex-Drinkers Who Describe Themselves as Lifetime Abstainers

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posted on 2025-01-16, 04:27 authored by Sarah CallinanSarah Callinan, Tanya Chikritzhs, Michael LivingstonMichael Livingston

Objective: Misclassification of self-reported lifetime abstainers from alcohol has been shown to bias studies that examine the long-term health effects of alcohol, notably the health benefits from moderate drinking. This article uses 16 waves of longitudinal data to examine the consistency of self-reported drinker status.

Method: Participants were drawn from the 17,964 respondents who completed the Household Income and Labour Dynamics in Australia survey in 2016. Of these, 807 participants met the inclusion criterion of completing at least six surveys between 2001 and 2016 and reported that they had never consumed alcohol in 2016. The drinking status of the participants in the previous 15 waves was examined for inconsistencies.

Results: Less than half (44%) of respondents who described themselves as lifetime abstainers in 2016 had consistently given this response in all previous surveys. A further 8% had described themselves as ex-drinkers at some point without reporting any actual consumption, whereas the remaining 48% had reported alcohol consumption in a previous survey. The reported consumption of these respondents was generally low, and most drank rarely. However, 5% of self-reported lifetime abstainers had reported risky levels of consumption in a previous survey.

Conclusions: Most survey respondents who reported that they had never consumed alcohol in 2016 did report consuming at least some alcohol (or at least being an ex-drinker) in previous surveys. Self-report of lifetime abstention may not be accurately separating lifetime abstainers from ex-drinkers, possibly biasing work on the harms and benefits of moderate consumption.


Funding

Sarah Callinan is supported by an Australian Research Council Discovery Early Career Research Award (DE180100016). Michael Livingston is supported by a National Health and Medical Research Council Career Development Fellowship (GNT1123840). The Centre for Alcohol Policy Research is funded by the Foundation for Alcohol Research and Education, an independent, charitable organization working to prevent the harmful use of alcohol in Australia (www.fare.org.au). This article uses unit record data from the Household Income and Labour Dynamics Survey in Australia (HILDA) Survey. The HILDA project was initiated and is funded by the Australian Government Department of Families, Housing, Community Services, and Indigenous Affairs (FaHCSIA) and is managed by the Melbourne Institute of Applied Economic and Social Research (Melbourne Institute).

History

Publication Date

2019-09-01

Journal

Journal of Studies on Alcohol and Drugs

Volume

80

Issue

5

Pagination

5p. (p. 552-556)

Publisher

Rutgers University

ISSN

1937-1888

Rights Statement

© 2019 Rutgers University This manuscript version is made available with permission from Rutgers University.

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