PARENT-CHILD CLOSENESS AFFECTS THE SIMILARITY OF DRINKING LEVELS BETWEEN PARENTS AND THEIR COLLEGE-AGE CHILDREN

College males reported drinking more frequently and in higher amounts than females. Correlations between quantity-frequency (QF) indices of drinking by parents and by their college-age children showed the great est similarity between fathers and sons. Log linear analyses compared each parent's drinking level against each of three other factors that might affect the QF levels of college-age children: the relationship b etween parent and child, the effect of the parent's drinking on the pa rent, and how the parent's drinking affected their treatment of the ch ild. The results supported models in which the relationship of each pa rent's drinking on the QF levels of both sons and daughters was affect ed by the closeness of the parent-child relationship. However, there w as no support for models involving how each parent's drinking affected that parent or how each parent's drinking affected their treatment of the child.