EXAMINING FACTORS INFLUENCING ALCOHOL USE AMONG UNIVERSITY STUDENTS IN LAGOS, NIGERIA.

Abstract

Alcohol use among university students keeps increasing, suggesting that it is a public health issue. As students in developing nations will become part of the labour force in the future, it is therefore important to study alcohol use among university students in Nigeria. This study aimed to examine the relationship between sleep quality, psychological well-being, and alcohol use, and gender differences in alcohol use among students of the University of Lagos in Nigeria. The study was a descriptive, cross-sectional study using questionnaires organised into 4 sections to define the variables under consideration. Section A was designed to measure bio-data of the respondents; Section B used the Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index (PSQI) to measure sleep quality; Section C utilised the 18-item Psychological Well-being Scale to measure psychological well-being; and Section D used a scale measuring alcohol use with the Alcohol Use Disorders Identification Test (AUDIT). 329 participants (X: 2.74, SD: 3.708) were selected through a non-probabilistic convenience sampling technique. Pearson's Product-Moment Correlation and the independent-samples t-test were used to test the hypotheses. Results revealed that there was a positive relationship between sleep quality and alcohol use(r = .168, p<.01) and psychological well-being (r =- .168, p<.01), and there was a negative relationship with alcohol use; there was a gender difference in alcohol use. The study shows that with better sleep quality, the students use more alcohol and with poor psychological well-being, the students use more alcohol. Additionally, male students consumed more alcohol than female students.