• Deena J Chisolm, Jennifer A Manganello, Kelly J Kelleher, and Michael P Marshal.
• Department of Pediatrics, The Ohio State University College of Medicine, Columbus, USA; The Research Institute at Nationwide Children's Hospital, Columbus, USA. Electronic address: Deena.Chisolm@NationwideChildrens.org.
• Patient Educ Couns. 2014 Nov 1; 97 (2): 291-6.

ObjectiveAlcohol expectancies are developed, in part, through exposure to health messages, the understanding of which may be influenced by health literacy. This study explores the relationships among health literacy, alcohol expectancies, and alcohol use behaviors in teens.MethodsWe studied alcohol use behaviors in the past six months in youths aged 14-19 recruited from two adolescent medicine clinics. We assessed covariate-adjusted bivariate relationships between HL, expectancies, and four measures of alcohol use and tested health literacy as a moderator of the relationship between expectancies and use.ResultsOf the 293 study teens, 45 percent reported use of alcohol in the past six months. Use behaviors were positively associated with higher health literacy and positive expectancies. Our moderation model suggested that health literacy moderates the relationship between expectancies and use, with the expectancy/use relationship being significantly stronger in higher literacy teens.ConclusionFindings suggest that health literacy can influence alcohol expectancies and behaviors.Practice ImplicationsHealth literacy should be explicitly considered in the design of alcohol prevention messages.Copyright © 2014 Elsevier Ireland Ltd. All rights reserved.

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