Tobacco and alcohol use among firefighters during their first 3 years of service.
Journal Article (Journal Article)
Firefighters constitute an understudied occupational group that are exposed to a great deal of occupational stress including potentially traumatic stress. As such, higher prevalence rates of posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and substance use disorders have been observed within this population; however, very little is known about the trajectories of health-risk behaviors among firefighters in response to occupational stress over time. The present study enrolled 322 fire service recruits from 7 urban U.S. professional fire departments and followed them through the first 3 years of service. All enrollees were free of Axis I psychopathology at the time of baseline assessments, which were conducted while participants were still enrolled in the fire academy. We hypothesized that: (a) firefighters who used tobacco would have higher levels of alcohol use over time; and (b) firefighters with higher levels of traumatic exposure and mental health symptoms would evidence a stronger multisubstance risk pattern. Analyses provided support for our first hypothesis and revealed that depressive symptoms (but neither trauma exposure nor PTSD symptoms) moderated the alcohol-tobacco relationship. The clinical and public safety implications of these results are discussed. (PsycINFO Database Record
Full Text
Duke Authors
Cited Authors
- Gulliver, SB; Zimering, R; Knight, J; Morissette, S; Kamholz, B; Meyer, E; Keane, T; Pennington, M; Denman, T; Carpenter, T; Kimbrel, N
Published Date
- May 2018
Published In
Volume / Issue
- 32 / 3
Start / End Page
- 255 - 263
PubMed ID
- 29771556
Electronic International Standard Serial Number (EISSN)
- 1939-1501
Digital Object Identifier (DOI)
- 10.1037/adb0000366
Language
- eng
Conference Location
- United States