Abstract
Objectives: To investigate the drinking behavior and related factors of community residents in G city. Methods: Examination was executed with questionnaire to 1973 adults. Data were collected from October 1, 2005 to November 16, 2005. Drinking behavior involves rate of drinking, frequency of drinking, age of starting drinking, drinking amount, rate of attempts to drink moderately and reasons for reducing drinking. Related factors involves the general characteristics, the habits of health behaviors. This was analyzed with frequency, percentage, mean, standard deviation, x2-test, t-test, ANOVA and logistic regression. Results: The drinking rate of the respondents was 67.4%, that rate of male was 83.1%, while that rate of female was 52.5%. The drinking rate was higher in groups of younger aged and highly educated people than that rate of the other groups. The highest level of drinking frequency was ones or twice a week. The drinking frequency of those who drank more than three times weekly was higher in the groups of male, old aged, married people, low educated people, rural residents, farmers or fisherman or laborers and those who unemployed or who did not exercise frequently and control their body weight. These individuals also preferred salty food and meat and fish, dined out frequently, did not visit dental clinic regularly, and tend to be smokers. The mean of the age of starting drinking was 21.17 year-old, that of males was 19.94 year-old, that of females was 22.82 year-old. The mean of the age of starting drinking was lower in groups of male, young aged, unmarried, college educated, rural residents, clerks, high monthly income, healthy and no illness, and smokers than that of the other group. The average of the drinking amount was 5.77 pack, that of males was 7.41 pack, and that of females was 3.31 pack. The drinking amount is much more in groups of males, fifties, unmarried, college educated, rural residents, self-employed, healthy people, and smoker than the other. 33.4% of the respondents attempted to drink moderately. According to the reasons of trying to drink moderately, the rate of prevention illness was highest. Conclusions: The variables of influencing drinking were sex, marital status, education, smoking, monthly income, health status, and stress.