All respondents who consumed at least one alcoholic drink in their lifetime were assessed for alcohol dependence. Lifetime alcohol dependence was classified if respondents reported at least three of seven DSM-IV alcohol dependence criteria (APA, 1994) within a 12- month period in at least one of four time-frames including: (1) prior to the past year at Wave 1; (2) in the past year at Wave 1; (3) since Wave 1 but prior to the past year at Wave 2; (4) in the past year at Wave 2. AUDADIS alcohol dependence diagnoses have good to excellent reliability (kappa=0.63–0.75) in clinical and epidemiological studies in the USA and internationally (Grant et al. 1995; Chatterji et al. 1997; Pull et al. 1997; Ustun et al. 1997; Hasin et al. 2006, 2007) and good validity as evidenced by various strategies including clinician re-appraisals (Pull et al. 1997; Canino et al. 1999). We focused on alcohol dependence because this diagnosis is more reliable and valid than alcohol abuse (Hasin et al. 2006).
