Societal influences can shape drinking behavior among immigrants to the United States. In 2010, nearly 40 million people, or 13 percent of the U.S. population, had been born in another country—the largest absolute number of U.S. immigrants ever and the highest proportion who are foreign born since the 1920s (Grieco et al. 2012). With wide diversity among immigrants in terms of national origin, language, religion, and social class, and with even more reasons for and processes of migration than ever before (Dubowitz et al. 2010), it is no surprise that the evidence on alcohol consumption among immigrants is similarly complex.
