A third factor impacting whether adolescents progress along the internalizing pathway to SUDs is drinking motives. Specifically, adolescents following the internalizing pathway to SUDs may develop strong motives to use substances as a means of coping or reducing tension. Such motives may emerge from earlier coping expectancies for substance use (Kuntsche, Knibbe, Engels, & Gmel, 2007). Three factors may in part impact the strength of these motives. First, coping motives are associated with internalizing symptoms (Rafnsson, Jonsson, & Windle, 2006; Tubman, Wagner, & Langer, 2003) and a long history of internalizing symptoms may underlie these motives in youth traveling the internalizing pathway and seeking to mitigate continued distress. Second, deviant peer groups may also reinforce these motives, given evidence for the social transmission and reinforcement of not only substance use behaviors but also coping motives associated with heavy substance use (Hussong, 2003). And, third, individual differences in the extent to which alcohol actually functions to physiologically reduce tension and stress also may impact this risk. Notably, COAs experience greater reductions than do children of non-alcoholic parents in their physiological stress
