Functional limitation, pain, and alcohol use: Exploring gender differences in the mediating role of depressive symptoms

Objective: This study considered the processes linking functional limitation and pain with depressive symptoms and two alcohol-related outcomes (past-month drinking and problematic drinking) over a 3-year period. Method: Data were drawn from a two-wave Miami-Dade County community study of people with physical disabilities (N = 559). Structural equation modeling was used to assess whether depressive symptoms mediated the associations among functional limitation, bodily pain, and the alcohol-related outcomes considered, and whether these associations were moderated by gender. Results: When the effects of the sociodemographic control variables were controlled for, depressive symptoms partly explained the effects of Wave 1 functional limitation and bodily pain on problematic drinking at Wave 2. The mediating effects of depressive symptoms on problematic drinking were significantly greater for men than for women. Conclusions: The findings demonstrate clear linkages between two physical health indicators, depressive symptoms and drinking, and highlight the circumstances in which gender matters most for understanding these associations.