The focus of the paper is to present the scholarly article that uses the statistical analysis with primary research. I found the primary research article that was dealing with one of the contemporary issues of the United States – alcohol consumption. It affects the health of an individual and has effects on the whole nation and society since it results in economic loss, more health care expenditures and loss of productivity. Alcoholism and abuse of alcohol in the United State are a big social and health problem. National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism reported of 16.6 million adults in the United with an alcohol disorder. Its problem is more severe among males and the numbers of youth with the developed alcohol disorder was at 697.000. Another staggering information of approximately 90.000 deaths associated with the country with alcohol related causes, which result in economic and social burden (National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism, 2013). Because of the presented statistics the next scholarly article and research about the drinking patterns matters even more.
The intended purpose of the study is to examine the alcohol drinking patterns. There were two hypotheses examined in the scholarly article with the goal to describe the prevalence of alcohol drinking pattern and self-port raided alcohol related harm - ARH in the study sample. They researched whether the drinking patterns, increased the risk of ARH, are drinks per occasion more predictive of ARH and correlation of ARH among respondents. The first hypothesis was “Alcohol drinking patterns (i.e., frequency of drinking and number of drinks per occasion) will increase the risk of ARH, even after controlling potential confounders” and second hypothesis »Drinks per occasion will be more predictive of ARH than frequency of drinking« (Antai, Anthony, Antai J. and Lopez, 2014). The research questions and hypothesis address the problems stated to be examined in the introduction of the paper.
The content in the purpose statements, research questions and hypothesis define the methodology used in the study with the main interest in conducting the research study. It tackles the so far unsolved questions about an important public health problem and the major goals that the research wants to achieve. It described in the detail the methodology used from statistic to gathering of information and data analysis. There is also a limitation mentions such as self-perceived ARH. The application will have the effect on society in order how to better fight with the issue of the alcohol consumption and its patterns of consumption. The research points out the importance of the ARH discussion. Understanding the patterns of alcohol consumption is necessary since they have the economic, social and health consequences. So far research has paid little attention to the social interaction. The research predicts the potential factor that can increase ARH: early age of initiation and drinking of alcohol, men, family history, comorbid substance use, poor physical and mental health and ethnicity (Antai, Anthony, Antai J. and Lopez, 2014).
The data were collected based on the face-to-face interview between February 2011 and April 2013. The survey consisted of two parts in the first part the demographic section, with sex, gender, education, age, income and marital status was examined and in the second part chronic physical disorders, risk factors, costs of illness. The data were analyzed with the Pearson chi-square test to show the statistical significance of differences in the distribution and frequency of ARH and alcohol drinking patterns among the participant of the survey. The statistical significance was set at P < 0.05 and two sided. The study did further use also other statistical tests and used the logistic regression models and different multivariate models which will not be debated since the purpose of the paper is to focus on the Chi-square statistics (Antai, Anthony, Antai J. and Lopez, 2014).
The benefit of using the selected statistical test – Pearson Chi-square test was to determine the statistical significance in the frequency distribution of ARH and patterns of alcohol drinking. The Chi-square was used since there was the assumption of the dependent variables, which means that the variables have an effect on each other and are not independent. With the test the significant association between the variables can be shown by making null and alternative hypothesis. One was that there is no correlation and other there is a significant statistical correlation. With the test they showed there is a relationship between used variables and showed the strong evidence of a relationship between the sociodemographic alcohol patterns and prevalence of ARH (Tomek & Schumacker, 2013). With defining which variables were significant, the research further focused on only the significant ones in using other statistical tests.
The frequency and prevalence of ARH of sociodemographic and alcohol using patters showed that the most common types of ARH were with 12% “family worries or complaints about alcohol use”, with 7% “drinking problem causing family/friend problems” and 5% “drinking interfered with the work/ school/ job/ home, and 1% were “alcohol use causing problems with others”. There were shown the difference among sexes, where males were more frequently associated with the measures of ARH. Also the age plays an important role since among the participants younger than 49 the measures of ARH were higher. There was also grater ARH measure shown by the non-Hispanic blacks. The statistical significance was shown also among individuals who did not drink and the ones who drink daily in the frequency in reporting of measures of ARH, where first more frequently reported almost all measures. The least prevalence of ARH was reported by individuals with higher education. Age and ethnicity seem to play an important role (Antai, Anthony, Antai J. and Lopez, 2014).
The evidence are provided that in the country the comprehensive alcohol prevention strategies are needed to prevent ARH and greater public health prevention aimed at entire populations of drinkers. The efforts should be especially made to reach the high alcohol consumers. Alcohol drinking patterns were connected with increased risk of self-reported ARH. Males had a higher likelihood of reported ARH. The association between alcohol use patterns and self-portrayed ARH was examined. The major part of the total burden of ARH was contributed by the moderate drinkers (Antai, Anthony, Antai J. and Lopez, 2014).
Work cited
Antai, D., Anthony, D. S., Antai, J., Lopez, G. B. (2014). Alcohol Drinking Patterns and Differences in Alcohol-Related Harm: a Population-Based Study of the United States. Retrieved: http://www.hindawi.com/journals/bmri/2014/853410/
National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism. (2013). Alcohol Facts and Statistics (2013). Retrieved from http://www.niaaa.nih.gov/alcohol-health/overview-alcohol-consumption/alcohol-facts-and-statistics
Tomek, Sara, Schumacker, Randall. (2013). Understanding Statistics, Using R. New York: Springer.
