A longitudinal examination of alcohol cessation and academic outcomes among a sample of Canadian secondary school students

Abstract

Introduction: The negative effects of alcohol consumption on learning ability and intellectual development of youth may be recovered after cessation. This study explored to what extent reduction or complete cessation of alcohol consumption affects school performance of secondary school students.

Methods: Alcohol use was self-reported by 37,223 grade 9-12 students attending 89 secondary schools across Ontario (n = 79) and Alberta (n = 10), Canada, participating in the COMPASS study over four years (school years 2013-14 to 2016-17). Measures included past-year frequency of drinking and frequency of binge drinking. A first-order autoregressive multinomial logistic regression was used to establish the impact of reduction or cessation of alcohol use on school performance.

Results: During follow-up, 1465 (6.4%) reductions and 1903 (8.3%) cessations in alcohol consumption, and 1447 (10.1%) reductions and 2147 (14.9%) cessations of binge drinking were reported. Male students reported more cessation in both drinking (9.7% male vs 7.1% female) and binge drinking (15.6% male vs 14.4% female), though female students had higher rates of reductions. Students who quit or reduced their drinking or binge drinking were less likely to skip classes, leave their homework incomplete, or expect to get or to aspire to educational qualifications above a high school diploma compared to those who continued their alcohol use.

Conclusions: Aside from health benefits, reduction or cessation of alcohol use may improve students' academic rigor. Prioritising school-based alcohol prevention efforts may therefore be beneficial for aspects of academic performance.

Keywords: Alcohol consumption; School performance; Substance; Youth.