Hostility, Stress, and the Endorsement of Alcohol Consumption in College Students

This paper examines the response of hostile and nonhostile individuals, as determined by the Cook-Medley Hostility Scale, in a low or high stress situation. The stress level was determined by which of two sets of anagrams the subject was given. The high stress situation involved administering anagrams that were unsolvable except for the first one and the low stress situation involved administering solvable anagrams. The endorsement of the use of alcohol by these subjects in simulated situations using vignettes was examined. The Michigan Alcohol Screening Test was also administered to determine those subjects who did not drink and to separate their scores from the social drinkers\u27 scores that were being analyzed. A sample of 121 college students was used as the subjects. A two-way analysis of variance revealed that students in the high stress condition endorsed the use of alcohol in the given situations more than the students in the low stress condition. Also, hostile students endorsed the use of alcohol more than nonhostile students. There was not a significant interaction between hostility and stress