Social Work Assistant Professor Ai Bo received an R21 grant from the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism for her study titled, “Mechanisms of parenting on adolescent alcohol use: A meta-analytic structural equation modeling study.” The co-investigator is Educational Psychology Professor Razia Azen.
Adolescent alcohol use is a pressing public health problem, and parents and caregivers play a major role in shaping it. This study asks two questions: which parenting factors and adolescent beliefs about alcohol most strongly predict use, and how parenting shapes those beliefs to influence drinking.
Using a meta-analytic approach that pools findings across many empirical studies, the project will give prevention researchers and program developers clearer guidance on which factors matter most and are worth prioritizing in future interventions. That’s especially useful in time-limited settings like pediatric primary care. Ultimately, the study is a foundational step toward scaling up prevention and reducing alcohol use and its harms across adolescent populations.