The roles of child maltreatment and fathers in the development of substance use in an at-risk sample of youth: A longitudinal study
Introduction
Substance use in adolescence is associated with a host of negative outcomes, including altered brain development, physical and mental health problems, risky sexual behavior, unintentional injuries, attempted suicide, and death (Gray & Squeglia, 2018; Marshall, 2014; Schulte & Hser, 2013; Spear, 2018; Thompson et al., 2017). Some studies have suggested that adolescents using a higher number of different types of substances (e.g., polysubstance use) show more adverse health outcomes than those not using substances or using one substance (Jones et al., 2017; Kelly et al., 2015; Kokkevi et al., 2014). Considering the poor outcomes associated with the higher levels of polysubstance use, it is vital to understand the developmental trajectory of substance use, including the initial level and growth rates of the number of substances used, among adolescents.
Addiction research has identified a variety of correlates of adolescent substance use, including genetic, neurobiological, psychological, environmental, and cultural determinants (Hussong et al., 2017; Trucco, 2020; Vrieze et al., 2012). Notably, existing scientific evidence points to exposure to childhood adversity, including child maltreatment, as a significant susceptibility factor for substance use in adolescence (Lansford et al., 2010; Shin et al., 2012; Tonmyr et al., 2010; Yoon et al., 2017). Adolescents with a history of child maltreatment have been found to be at heightened risk for heavy polysubstance use (Shin et al., 2010), the development of substance use disorders (De Sanctis et al., 2008), and early initiation of substance use (Proctor et al., 2017).
Although empirical evidence suggests an elevated risk for substance use among youth who have experienced maltreatment in childhood, it remains unclear which specific maltreatment characteristics, such as the type and perpetrator of maltreatment, more precisely predict substance use trajectories in adolescence. There have been mixed results on the long-term effects of different types of child maltreatment on adolescent substance use. For example, one study found that child neglect and physical abuse were associated with faster increases in binge drinking and persistently elevated binge drinking in adolescence whereas child sexual abuse was not related to the course of adolescent binge drinking (Shin et al., 2012). In contrast, in a longitudinal study of 7214 adolescents, emotional abuse and neglect, but not physical and sexual abuse, were related to cannabis misuse and heavy drinking by age 21 (Strathearn et al., 2020). Another longitudinal study, which focused on trajectories of substance use among child welfare-involved youth, found that the high-stable substance use trajectory class, neglect, was related to increase in substance use over time whereas physical abuse was not significantly related to increases in substance use over time (Yampolskaya et al., 2019). Taken together, emotional abuse and neglect appear to have been most consistently associated with increasing substance use over time in adolescents.
Research is scare on perpetrator identity (e.g., maltreatment perpetrated by fathers vs. mothers) and its influence on adolescent substance use. This represents a critical knowledge gap, given that nearly 50% of reported child maltreatment cases are perpetrated by fathers, either alone or with a mother or other individual (US DHHS, 2020). Further, fathers are overrepresented as perpetrators in severe physical abuse cases that result in detrimental outcomes, such as abusive head injuries and child fatalities (Schnitzer & Ewigman, 2005; Scribano et al., 2013), thus warranting more research on the impact of father-perpetrated maltreatment on adolescent development.
Understanding a protective role fathers can play in adolescent development is equally important. It is well documented that fathers make an important contribution to children's development, beyond the mothers' contribution (Fosco et al., 2012; Yoon, Bellamy, et al., 2018). Emerging evidence suggests that father involvement is associated with resilience to substance use among adolescents (Fosco et al., 2012; Luk et al., 2017; Weymouth et al., 2019), though some studies have suggested that different aspects of father involvement may have differential impact on adolescent substance use (Henry et al., 2018). For example, one study found that it was the shared communication with and emotional closeness to fathers, not the simple participation in a shared activity, that had protective effects on adolescent alcohol use (Goncy & van Dulmen, 2010). These findings underscore the importance of examining various dimensions of father involvement, including both quality and quantity of father-child interactions.
Despite solid empirical evidence supporting the positive and protective effects of father involvement on substance use among general youth populations, such effects have not yet been comprehensively examined in a high-risk group of adolescents, such as those with a history of child maltreatment. Thus, it is unclear if the protective role played by fathers will hold true for adolescents who have experienced maltreatment by fathers. Father involvement may have different meaning or impact for adolescents with a history of child maltreatment due to unique challenges and complex family dynamics they face, such as father-perpetrated child maltreatment and father-perpetrated violence against the mother (Cavanagh et al., 2007; Dixon et al., 2007; Dubowitz et al., 2000). The few existing studies suggest preliminary evidence that positive father-child relationships serve as a protective factor for substance use among high-risk youths (Dubowitz, Roesch, Arria, et al., 2019; Yoon, Pei, et al., 2018), yet more research—longitudinal research in particular— is needed to understand the influence of father involvement on substance use trajectories among adolescents with a history of child maltreatment.
Taken together, little is known about the long-term influence of maltreatment characteristics and father involvement in the developmental course of substance use from early adolescence to late adolescence. Substance use is a developmental phenomenon, with initiation of substance use usually occurring between ages 14 and 18, peaking in emerging adulthood, and declining thereafter (Johnston et al., 2020). Thus, it is critical to understand the developmental processes underlying the initiation and progress in substance use behaviors among adolescents. This study sought to investigate the longitudinal impacts of child maltreatment and father involvement on the developmental trajectory of substance use among high-risk youth. Based on prior studies (Schnitzer & Ewigman, 2005; Scribano et al., 2013; Shin et al., 2012; Strathearn et al., 2020; Yampolskaya et al., 2019), we hypothesized that maltreatment perpetrated by fathers (alone or together with mother) and emotional abuse and neglect would be associated with a higher initial number and faster increase in the number of substances used over time. We also hypothesized that higher quality of father-child relationships would predict lower initial number and slower increase in the number of substances used over time among adolescents.
Section snippets
Participants and procedure
This study used data from the Longitudinal Studies of Child Abuse and Neglect (LONGSCAN). LONGSCAN is a consortium of five studies that share the common goal of examining the causes and consequences of child abuse and neglect (Larrabee & Lewis, 2016). Data were collected longitudinally from 1991 to 2012, by following the participants from baseline (age 4) through the age of 18. The primary data collection included face-to-face interviews with the focal child and the primary caregiver at child
Sample characteristics
Gender distribution was fairly equal, with females making up a little less than half of the sample (48.9%). Non-Hispanic Blacks (53.3%) represented the largest racial group, followed by non-Hispanic Whites (28.9%), Others (11.5%), and Hispanics (6.2%). The majority of mothers (77.0%) and fathers (88.0%) had at least a high school education. A little over half (55.0%) of mothers and three quarters (75.6%) of fathers were employed at T1 (i.e., at youth's age 12) and had a full-time or part-time
Discussion
Findings from this study contribute knowledge to the relationships among maltreatment dimensions (i.e., maltreatment type and perpetrator), father-child relationship quality and developmental trajectories of substance use during adolescence. In contrast to our hypothesis, there was no significant association between father-perpetrated maltreatment (i.e., maltreatment by father alone or father and mother together) and the developmental trajectory of substance use in adolescents. This finding is
Acknowledgments
This document includes data from the Consortium of Longitudinal Studies of Child Abuse and Neglect (LONGSCAN), which was funded by the Office on Child Abuse and Neglect (OCAN), Children's Bureau, Administration for Children and Families, Dept. of Health and Human Services (The National Center on Child Abuse and Neglect (NCCAN). The data were made available by the National Data Archive on Child Abuse and Neglect (NDACAN), Cornell University, Ithaca, NY, and have been used with permission. The
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