Social cognitive moderators of the relationship between social anxiety and alcohol outcomes in young people

Objective: Social anxiety has been linked to problem drinking in young people. Identifying moderators of this relationship will aid the development of effective interventions for this at-risk group. This cross-sectional study examined whether anticipated social outcomes and controlled drinking self-efficacy moderated the relationship between social anxiety and alcohol outcomes. Method: A total of 385 participants (drinkers and nondrinkers; mean age = 20.98, SD = 2.35; 65% female; 81% born in Australia), completed an online survey measuring alcohol consumption, alcohol-related harms, social anxiety, anticipated social outcomes, and controlled drinking self-efficacy. Regressions examined the interactive effects of social anxiety, anticipated social outcomes, and controlled drinking self-efficacy on alcohol consumption and alcohol-related harms. Results: A significant three-way interaction was found for alcohol consumption (95% CI [-0.523,-0.018]). Simple slopes revealed an inverse relationship between social anxiety and alcohol consumption when participants anticipated positive evaluations for being drunk and had high controlled drinking self-efficacy (95% CI [-1.181,-0.273]). The three-way interaction for alcohol-related harms was not significant (95% CI [-1.445, 0.799]). A significant two-way interaction revealed that the relationship between social anxiety and alcohol-related harms was only significant when individuals had low (95% CI [0.571, 3.943]), but not high (95% CI [-1.149, 0.735]), controlled drinking self-efficacy. Conclusions: Social anxiety was associated with reduced alcohol consumption when young people anticipated positive evaluations for being drunk and had high confidence to control their drinking. Further, social anxiety was associated with alcohol-related harms when young people had low confidence to control their drinking. Interventions for alcohol use among socially anxious young people could focus on increasing confidence to control drinking