Centre for Addiction and Mental Health, Addiction Research Foundation Division, 33 Russell Street, Toronto, Ontario, Canada M5S 2S1
Received 2 July 1999; in revised form 25 October 1999; accepted 10 November 1999
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ABSTRACT |
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INTRODUCTION |
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No previous studies have compared the relative ability of per capita alcohol consumption data and survey-derived information on patterns of alcohol consumption to predict aggregate levels of alcohol-related problem indicators. In Ontario, Canada, 12 surveys of alcohol consumption among adults have been conducted over the period 1977 to 1997. This creates a unique opportunity to compare how well per capita alcohol consumption figures and survey-derived measures of alcohol use relate to alcohol problem measures. The present paper addresses such a comparison.
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METHODS |
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In the years 1977 to 1991, six surveys were conducted using face-to-face interviews in households. The sample design, devised by Gallup, used a stratification system based on population and census data to create a modified probability sample in all centres with 1000 or more people, and a quota sampling in rural areas. The sampling procedure was intended to provide an approximation of the adult population of Ontario, except for people living in institutions and in the far north. Across the six surveys, there were very few differences in the age, sex, or regional composition of the respondents. However, there were increases in the percentages reporting a professional occupation and decreases in the proportions of housewives, changes that were probably reflective of what was happening in the general population. Interviewers were instructed to interview one person per household, preferably the youngest adult male, but, if he was not at home, the youngest adult female was interviewed. Resulting sample sizes varied from 1041 to 1101.
In 1992, a switch was made to telephone interviewing, using random digit dialling and Computer-Assisted Telephone Interviewing. A sampling frame of all active area codes and exchanges in Ontario was used to select telephone numbers at random. Within households, the household member with the most recent birthday was selected. Twelve callbacks were made. Six surveys were performed between 1992 and 1997 using this system. In the years 1992 to 1995, the survey was conducted yearly with sample sizes of 994 to 2022. In 1996 and 1997, there was a monthly sampling and sample sizes increased, ranging from 2721 to 2776. The other aspects of the design remained the same. Available response rates over the years ranged from 62 to 71%, and these are comparable to response rates found in similar surveys.
A comparison was made in 1991 between the household sampling and telephone sampling methods (E. M. Adlaf and F. Ivis, under review). In that year, 1041 people were interviewed face-to-face and 1047 were interviewed by telephone using the same questions. The telephone method provided a better participation rate, but over-represented young people and those with higher incomes. There were no differences in the proportions of respondents in the two surveys reporting alcohol use in the past year, drinking five or more drinks at a sitting, or experiencing various harms associated with their drinking. However, fewer people in the telephone survey vs the face-to-face survey (5.0% vs 6.9%) reported daily drinking. For other frequency of drinking categories, there were no differences between the two types of surveys.
The survey questions used in this paper address frequency of drinking in the past year, daily drinking and drinking five or more drinks at a sitting on a weekly basis. There were minor variations between the face-to-face and telephone surveys in how the questions on drinking frequency and five or more drinks at a sitting were asked. However, these variations appeared to have no effect on the outcomes in the 1991 comparison between the two methods (E. M. Adlaf and F. Ivis, under review).
Data on per capita alcohol consumption in Ontario were obtained from Statistics Canada, which derives this information from beverage sales figures. Per capita consumption figures were expressed as litres of absolute alcohol for the population aged 15 years and over.
Liver cirrhosis mortality figures were also obtained from Statistics Canada publications and were expressed as rates/100 14;000 population aged 20 years and over. Hospital separation (equivalent to discharge) rates/100 14;000 total population were estimated for cases with a diagnosis of alcohol-dependence' syndrome and were based on information available for 1982 to 1993 from Statistics Canada publications. Information on charges for driving while impaired and on drink-drivers involved in fatal accidents came from Statistics Canada publications and from Ministry of Transportation and Communication (1998) reports. These were also expressed as rates/100 000 total population.
Pearson product-moment correlations were computed among all the measures.
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RESULTS |
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DISCUSSION |
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These results confirm the value of per capita alcohol consumption over survey results in predicting alcohol problem levels, such as liver cirrhosis mortality rates, alcohol-related hospital separation rates and rates of drink-driving charges and fatalities. No survey-based drinking patterns showed better correlations with problem indicators than did per capita alcohol consumption figures. However, daily alcohol consumption did correlate with all the problem indicators, albeit at slightly lower levels than did per capita consumption.
It is not clear why the heavy drinking measure (five or more drinks at a sitting) did not correlate with any of the alcohol problems. As a measure of short-term consumption, it may not be expected to correlate with liver cirrhosis mortality or hospital separations. However, heavy drinking per occasion was expected to correlate with the drink-driving problem measures. It may be that surveys underestimate the proportions of heavy drinkers more than they do the proportions of infrequent drinkers. Surveys also identify relatively few drinkers who consume five or more drinks at a sitting; usually the figure is less than 10% of those surveyed. This may be insufficient to locate large numbers of very heavy drinkers, for example those who drink 10 or more drinks per day. It is also possible that heavier drinkers are less likely to respond to surveys, although it seems unlikely that differential responding would have changed over time. Recent research suggests that the variance in alcohol consumption patterns is more related to acute problem levels, than are other measures of drinking behaviour (Treno et al., 1997).
The results of this study confirm the value of per capita alcohol consumption figures, as well as of survey-based data on daily drinking, in predicting population levels of alcohol problems. However, there is a need to replicate (using larger samples and more sophisticated analytical procedures) our observation that most survey-derived measures of drinking behaviour are not correlated with aggregate problem measures. A further concern is that collection of the problem measures may have been influenced by other factors (e.g. changes in drink-driving laws) in ways which have not yet been identified. Also, there is a need for studies examining the relationships among survey-derived consumption measures and acute alcohol problems, such as drunkenness, domestic and other types of violence and alcohol-related injuries.
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FOOTNOTES |
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