Alcohol Consumption among Adolescents in the City of Zagreb and the Presence of Alcohol Drinking among Their Parents

INTRODUCTIONAdolescence is a period in which majority of youth first come into contact with psychoactive substances. For some, this contact is ephemeral and without major consequences, while for others it can be fatal and lead to a complete change of lifestyle and development of addiction. Alcohol is a psychoactive substance that most adolescents consume. This is, besides its legality and availability, due to its eternal presence and incorporation into lifestyle and customs. Adolescents are not attracted by alcohol only because of the identification with the lifestyle of adults, but also as a means to temporarily take away the anxiety associated with feelings of being lost and confused in their current life phase. Alcohol consumption in adolescence is usually characterized with daily need for drinking, and often, intensive drinking on weekends. Experimenting with addictive substances among youth is usually motivated with curiosity, a desire for self-affirmation, imitation and self-assertion. As with adults, alcohol consumption among young people can stimulate and/or be accompanied by a number of other psychiatric disorders.1 With adolescents prone to alcohol use and general psychoactive substances, we can frequently observe behavior disorders, origins of antisocial and borderline personality disorder and mood disorders. These disorders may induce the use of psychoactive substances and lead to a behavioral model characterized by impulsivity, self destructive tendencies and disregard for the consequences of their actions.2-5Previous studies have suggested a number of factors that influence the use of psychoactive substances, such as the structure of adolescent personality, family dynamics, genetics and neurochemical and social factors. Due to the complex interaction of these factors it is difficult to determine the hierarchy of their importance in the development and preferences to alcohol consumption.6-9 Considering the important, if not the most important role that family has in the formation of identity in adolescence10 it is to be expected that the family functioning would be associated with general psychic adjustment of adolescents, their perception of self-esteem, a sense of competence, school achievement and behavioral disorders - delinquent behavior and use of addictive substances.11-13Early psychoanalytic theories made reference to oral regression and the similarity of the phenomenon of addiction with the earliest stage of libidinal development, when the child demands gratification of its desires without any ability to give. Addictive behavior is understood as a narcissistic phenomenon of obsession with achieving personal satisfaction. Recent theories describe dysfunction of the ego, the inability of processing painful and unpleasant feelings related to early object relations, while the cognitive approach attempts to identify negative models of thought related with the experience of adolescent identity confusion, lifestyle, projections of their future, relationship with their parents and peers, with the inability to develop different cognitive schemes. Some studies have shown that, among adolescents who are prone to consuming psychoactive substances the traits of pessimism, impulsiveness, auto-aggression and low self-esteem are more accentuated.2'4SUBJECTS AND METHODSThis study was conducted on 701 high school students in Zagreb during the school year 2011/2012. Selection included 13 general secondary school classes and 18 vocational high school classes. In each school, students engaged in the study came from 1st to 4th grade or, for vocational schools, 1st to 3rd grade. After attaining a written permission of the Ministry of Science, Education and Sports, the directors of schools in which the study was conducted were informed on the implementation of research and parents of students in selected classes were sent a notification in which the objectives, methods and modus of research were briefly explained. …