Validation of an Online Version of the Alcohol Use Disorders Identification Test (AUDIT) for Alcohol Screening in Spanish University Students

Online alcohol screening may be helpful in preventing alcohol use disorders. We assessed psychometric properties of an online version of the Alcohol Use Disorders Identification Test (AUDIT) among Spanish university students. We used a longitudinal online survey (the UNIVERSAL project) of first-year students (18–24 years old) in five universities, including the AUDIT, as part of the WHO World Mental Health International College Student (WMH-ICS) initiative. A reappraisal interview was carried out with the Timeline Followback (TLFB) for alcohol consumption categories and the Mini International Neuropsychiatric Interview (MINI) for alcohol use disorder. Reliability, construct validity and diagnostic accuracy were assessed. Results: 287 students (75% women) completed the MINI, of whom 242 also completed the TLFB. AUDIT’s Cronbach’s alpha was 0.82. The confirmatory factor analysis for the one-factor solution of the AUDIT showed a good fit to the data. Significant AUDIT score differences were observed by TLFB categories and by MINI disorders. Areas under the curve (AUC) were very large for dependence (AUC = 0.96) and adequate for consumption categories (AUC > 0.7). AUDIT cut-off points of 6/8 (women/men) for moderate-risk drinking and 13 for alcohol dependence showed sensitivity/specificity of 76.2%/78.9% and 56%/97.5%, respectively. The online version of the AUDIT is useful for detecting alcohol consumption categories and alcohol dependence in Spanish university students.This research was funded by Fondo de Investigación Sanitaria, Instituto de Salud Carlos III FEDER (PI13/00343); Ministerio de Sanidad, Consumo y Bienestar Social, Plan Nacional Sobre Drogas PNSD (exp.2015I015); and from the DIUE of the Generalitat de Catalunya (2017SGR452). L. Ballester was supported by an FPU grant (FPU15/05728); M. J. Blasco was supported by a Río Hortega grant (ISCIII, CM14/00125); P. Castellví was supported by a Sara Borrell grant (ISCIII, CD12/00440), the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF), the European Commission, the University of Jaén, Spain (R08/06/2018) and the Instituto de Estudios Giennenses; and P. Mortier was supported by a Sara Borrell grant (ISCIII, CD18/00049)