Original articleAcculturation and interrelationships between problem and health-promoting behaviors among Latino adolescents
Section snippets
Methods
Latino adolescents aged 11 to 19 (M = 15) years were recruited from two public health clinics in Los Angeles County (n = 609, 48.8% boys). Active consent was obtained from the parents before the adolescents’ participation, with a refusal rate of 22%. Sixty-one percent of the participants requested that their interview be conducted in Spanish. All instruments were back-translated to ensure consistency between the English and Spanish versions of the survey. Approval for this study was obtained
Frequency of problem behaviors
The frequency of substance use is summarized in Table 1. As might be expected, alcohol and cigarettes were the most frequently previously used substances in this sample. However, only a small percentage (4.5%) of respondents who used alcohol reported a frequency of use of 2–6 times per week or more, whereas cigarette smokers reported a higher frequency of use (13.5% reported 2–6 times per week or more). Fifty-nine percent of the sample used none of the substances and received a score of 0 on
Discussion
We found problem and health-promoting behaviors to be associated with indices of acculturation. Increased acculturation was associated with a greater tendency to engage in problem behaviors and a decreased likelihood of engaging in select health-promoting behaviors. Cigarette smoking, alcohol use, and sexual intercourse were associated with language use and country of origin used as indices of acculturation. The finding that acculturated Latino adolescents were more likely to engage in problem
Acknowledgements
This research was supported by a grant from the National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute (RO1-HL55770-02) to Donald E. Morisky, Sc.D., including supplement support for the research of Carl D. Sneed (RO1-HL55770-02S1). This research was also supported by a grant from National Institutes of Mental Health to the Center for HIV Identification, Prevention, and Treatment Services to Mary Jane Rotheram-Borus, Ph.D. (P3DMH58107). The authors thank the site coordinators Dahlia Fuentes and Debra Smith.
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