The current study offers support for our primary hypotheses that the age of first drink is associated with characteristics that themselves predict future alcohol problems. This is one of the few studies to prospectively evaluate multiple risk factors that are likely to impact on how the AFD performs in predicting subsequent alcohol problems. The data demonstrated that several risk factors operated relatively independently of each other in predicting the AFD (e.g. sex, FH of AUDS, prior marijuana use, and conduct problems) and all need to be considered together when evaluating whether AFD predicts later alcohol problems and AUDs.
