Religious influences on heavy episodic drinking in Chinese-American and Korean-American college students.

OBJECTIVE: The purpose of the current study was to examine religious influences that relate to heavy episodic drinking in Chinese-American and Korean-American college students, after controlling for the effects of ALDH2 gene status.
METHOD: Participants (159 Chinese-American and 188 Korean-American college students) were assessed for the presence or absence of a heavy drinking episode in the past 2 weeks, using a gender-specific measure. All participants also reported their religious affiliation and the number of religious services attended in the past year, and were genotyped at the ALDH2 locus.
RESULTS: Chinese were less likely than Koreans to be affiliated with any religion (55% vs 84%), but were more likely to be affiliated with Eastern religions (12% vs 1%). When controlling for the effects of ALDH2 status, service attendance significantly related to lower rates of heavy episodic drinking in Koreans, but did not reach significance in Chinese. The relationship was significant, however, in Chinese affiliated with Western religions. In addition, religious service attendance only related to heavy drinking in individuals with ALDH2*1/*1 genotype.
CONCLUSIONS: These results suggest religious service attendance is inversely related to heavy episodic drinking in Korean Americans and in Chinese Americans with Western religious affiliation. Moreover, service attendance appears to more strongly influence heavy drinking in individuals who are not already protected by an ALDH2*2 allele.