How Adolescents and Parents See Their Moral Responsibilities With Regard to Adolescents Using Alcohol-A Deductive Secondary Analysis

Abstract

Background: This study described how adolescents and the parents saw their moral responsibilities with regard to adolescents using alcohol.

Methods: This was a deductive secondary analysis, based on Hart's taxonomy of moral responsibility. The primary studies were based on 19 group interviews with 87 adolescents aged 14-16 and 17 interviews with 20 parents. Voluntary participants were recruited by purposive sampling from two public schools in Finland.

Results: Role responsibilities comprised of adolescents taking care of themselves and parents providing authority figures and helping adolescents to make rational decisions about alcohol. Capacity responsibilities referred to adolescents' abilities to make independent decisions on using alcohol and their developing abilities to control their actions. Parents required abilities to get involved in and show an interest in their children's everyday lives. Causal responsibilities focused on ensuring that adolescents did not cause harm when they used alcohol, and parents had to acknowledge and react to the consequences. Liability responsibilities were about the law on alcohol use and responsibilities for any legal consequences. The role schools could play was important.

Conclusions: Adolescents and parents had wide-ranging responsibilities related to the adolescents' using alcohol and school nurses could play an important role in healthy decisions.

Keywords: adolescents; alcohol; deductive secondary analysis; parents; responsibility.