# Early environmental risk for the development of urgency and subsequent problem drinking

> **NIH NIH F31** · UNIVERSITY OF KENTUCKY · 2022 · $46,752

## Abstract

The proposed study aims to investigate, longitudinally, childhood maladaptive emotion socialization as a risk
factor for the development of urgency (the tendency to act rashly when experiencing strong emotions) and
subsequent problem drinking in adolescents. Identifying potentially modifiable antecedents of urgency is
important because a large body of literature has implicated urgency in the risk process for adolescent
problematic drinking (as well as other impulsigenic behaviors such as bulimic behavior, risky sex, and
gambling) (Berg et al., 2016; Coskunpinar et al., 2013; Fischer et al., 2008; Stautz & Cooper, 2013).
Adolescent drinking is associated with numerous public health harms including physical safety risks, increased
risk for psychiatric disorder, increases in maladaptive personality traits, and increased risk for premature death
(Birkley et al., 2015; De Bellis et al., 2000; Hingson & Zha, 2006; Kaminer, 2016; Marshall, 2014; Guller &
Smith, 2015). The relationship between urgency and problem drinking reciprocal such that increases in each
factor precipitate increases in the other (Riley et al, 2016). Though the relationship between urgency and
problem drinking has been studied extensively, little is known about the etiology of urgency itself. Cyders and
Smith (2008) proposed a developmental model of urgency in which childhood temperament and environmental
factors increase risk for urgency, but only temperament has been examined in the literature (Waddell et al.,
2021). Hersh and Hussong (2009) identified a significant relationship between negative parental emotion
socialization and increased substance use in adolescence and, in our own work, we found cross-sectional
associations consistent with the hypothesis that urgency mediates the predictive influence of maladaptive
emotion socialization on adolescent drinking (Atkinson et al., under review). To date, no studies have
examined, longitudinally, the relationship between childhood maladaptive emotion socialization, urgency, and
subsequent problem drinking. The research component of this proposal involves a two-wave longitudinal
design to (a) test whether maladaptive emotion socialization predicts increases in urgency, (b) examine the
possibility that maladaptive emotion socialization predicts problem drinking, mediated by urgency, and (c)
examine whether these relationships are invariant by race and gender, in a sample of 9th grade students.
Identifying environmental risk factors for the development of urgency will provide clear targets for early
intervention and prevention efforts: interrupting the development of urgency is likely to reduce risk for problem
drinking and related behaviors. The training component of this proposal includes (1) the execution and
management of a longitudinal study in a public school setting, including data collection, liaising with school
officials, and follow-up; (2) development of complex statistical analytic skills; (3) further advanced training in
r...

## Key facts

- **NIH application ID:** 10463101
- **Project number:** 1F31AA030172-01
- **Recipient organization:** UNIVERSITY OF KENTUCKY
- **Principal Investigator:** Emily A. Atkinson
- **Activity code:** F31 (R01, R21, SBIR, etc.)
- **Funding institute:** NIH
- **Fiscal year:** 2022
- **Award amount:** $46,752
- **Award type:** 1
- **Project period:** 2022-04-24 → 2024-04-23

## Primary source

NIH RePORTER: https://reporter.nih.gov/project-details/10463101

## Citation

> US National Institutes of Health, RePORTER application 10463101, Early environmental risk for the development of urgency and subsequent problem drinking (1F31AA030172-01). Retrieved via AI Analytics 2026-05-24 from https://api.ai-analytics.org/grant/nih/10463101. Licensed CC0.

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