Faculty Publications

College Student Employment And Drinking: A Daily Study Of Work Stressors, Alcohol Expectancies, And Alcohol Consumption

Document Type

Article

Keywords

Alcohol and alcoholism expectancies, College students, Employment, Work stressors

Journal/Book/Conference Title

Journal of Occupational Health Psychology

Volume

15

Issue

3

First Page

291

Last Page

303

Abstract

We examined the within-person relationships between daily work stressors and alcohol consumption over 14 consecutive days in a sample of 106 employed college students. Using a tension reduction theoretical framework, we predicted that exposure to work stressors would increase alcohol consumption by employed college students, particularly for men and those with stronger daily expectancies about the tension reducing properties of alcohol. After controlling for day of the week, we found that hours worked were positively related to number of drinks consumed. Workload was unrelated to alcohol consumption, and work-school conflict was negatively related to consumption, particularly when students expressed strong beliefs in the tension reducing properties of alcohol. There was no evidence that the effects of work stressors were moderated by sex. The results illustrate that employment during the academic year plays a significant role in college student drinking and suggest that the employment context may be an appropriate intervention site to address the problem of student drinking. © 2010 American Psychological Association.

Department

Department of Psychology

Original Publication Date

7-1-2010

DOI of published version

10.1037/a0019822

Link to Full Text

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