Dampened psychobiological responses to stress and substance use in adolescence

Abstract

Substance use increases throughout adolescence, and earlier substance use may increase risk for poorer health. However, limited research has examined whether stress responses relate to adolescent substance use, especially among adolescents from ethnic minority and high-adversity backgrounds. The present study assessed whether blunted emotional and cortisol responses to stress at age 14 related to substance use by ages 14 and 16, and whether associations varied by poverty status and sex. A sample of 277 Mexican-origin youth (53.19% female; 68.35% below the poverty line) completed a social-evaluative stress task, which was culturally adapted for this population, and provided saliva samples and rated their anger, sadness, and happiness throughout the task. They also reported whether they had ever used alcohol, marijuana, cigarettes, and vaping of nicotine at age 14 and again at age 16. Multilevel models suggested that blunted cortisol reactivity to stress was associated with alcohol use by age 14 and vaping nicotine by age 16 among youth above the poverty line. Also, blunted sadness and happiness reactivity to stress was associated with use of marijuana and alcohol among female adolescents. Blunted stress responses may be a risk factor for substance use among youth above the poverty line and female adolescents.

Keywords: adolescence; cortisol; emotion; stress response; substance use.

Figure 1.

Cortisol responses to the TSST as a function of alcohol use by age 14 (a) and vaping of nicotine by age 16 (b) in youth above the poverty line. Note: *p<.05, **p<.01.

Figure 2.

Happiness responses to the TSST as a function of alcohol use by age 16.Analyses included all participants, regardless of alcohol use by age 14. Note: ***p<.001

Figure 3.

Anger responses (a) and sadness responses (b) to the TSST as a function of marijuana use by age 14 in female adolescents. Note: *p<.05, ***p<.001.

Figure 4.

Sadness responses to the TSST as a function of alcohol use by age 16 (a) and marijuana use by age 16 (b) in female adolescents. Analyses included all participants, regardless of substance use by age 14. Note: *p<.05, **p<.01, ***p<.001.

Figure 5.

Happiness reactivity to and recovery from the TSST as a function of initiation of cigarettes between ages 14 and 16 (a) and initiation of marijuana between ages 14 and 16 (b) among female adolescents. Analyses excluded participants who used each substance by age 14. Note: *p<.05, **p<.01, ***p<.001.