Alcohol is a key risk factor for chronic disease, injury and death, and is therefore of significant policy relevance. It raises key questions about causal processes, such as selection. Health guidance, policy, and early prevention require solid evidence about timing and mechanisms of dangers (or benefits) of drinking.

This project used data from the 1958 National Child Development Study (NCDS), 1970 British Cohort Study (BCS70), Millennium Cohort Study (MCS) and Next Steps (previously known as the Longitudinal Study of Young People in England, LSYPE).

Two connected streams of research are extending our prior US National Institutes of Health-funded work on predictors and consequences of alcohol use in the British cohort studies and facilitating closer collaboration with CLS investigators. Using over five decades of NCDS, BCS70, Next Steps, and MCS data covering childhood through midlife, our US-based team is collaborating with the other project leads to assess short- and long-term impacts of alcohol use on health-risk behaviours, mental health, and physical health.