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Week 4 - Visual Representation

The variables that were used in this assignment where the amount of beers consumed in the last 12 months (S2AQ5B), wine consumed in the last 12 months(S2AQ6B), age (AGE) and if the person get upset by being in any kind of social interaction (S7Q161).

The first two graphs were made to identify the amount of people that were in each group for beer and alcohol consumption. Eventhough this information has been already obtained in the last assingment in a table form, having a visual representation its always helpful to identify it more easily. The NA values were left in the graph to know just how much the missing data is compared to the rest.

For the beer consumption graph we can see that the concentration area is between the groups 4 and 6, which means that most of the people only drink beer twice a week or twice and month. On the other hand the lowest concetration values are located in the first groups, where the amount of beer consumed is nearly everyday.

For the second graph, wine consumption, the concentration is located in the higher values, these being 6 and 7, which demostrates most individuals only consume about 1 drink of wine per month. This shows how the consumption of beer is more prominent than wine

In order to determine if there is a corrolation between the consumption of alcoholic beverages and uneasiness in social interactions three diffrent graphs were made. The first one puts together the diffrent group types for wine consumption and the situation in social interaction (the value choosen for social interaction was 1 instead of 2 since the first one represents uneasiness and the latest comfort). As we can see the group that has the most problems dealing with social situations are the ones that consume a glass of wine once per month (6-7) while the ones that drink almost every day (1-3) are more comfortable with this kind of situations.

The second graph is practically the same with the only difference being that wine consumption was changed to beer. This shows a similar trend in which the group that shows the most discomfort during social interactions are the ones that consume roughly 1 beer per month and the ones that consume daily are okay dealing with social interactions. Having analyzed this two graphs we can determine that there is a corrolation between the amount of alcohol consumed and the approach to social interactions, in which the more one drinks the more it feels comfortable with social situations.

The last graph made was regarding the different age groups and their uneasiness towards social interactions. This shows that the youngest and oldest people in the survey, 18-23 and 70 or more, have a tendency to be more at ease when interacting with others, while the rest of the groups tend to feel more uncomfortable with this kind of situations.

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Week 3 - Program

The used variables for this program were the amout of alcohol consumed in the last 12 monts, the amount of wine consumed in the last 12 months, age and if social interactions generated a level of uncomfortness.

What was done first was to distribute the data depending on the percentiles and the intervals of each set of data. The first data distribution done was for age ("AGE"), where the most concentration was located between the ages of 50 and 70. This set was choosen since we can now determine how the consumption of alcoholic beverages (wine and beer) can affect social interactions depending on the age of the individual. The other variable used, Thinking about/being in/avoid social situation upset you/made you feel uncomfortable ("S7Q161") was not distributed in diffrent sections since it only contains two values which are already separated.

The sets of data used for the remaining variables was beer ("S2AQ5B") and wine ("S2AQ6B")consumption in the last 12 months. For each set of data the distribution according to the percentiles were made, resulting in both of them having the most concentration in the 75-100%. The number of intervals used were 5 since that way the concentration of values can be more concentrated and easier to identiy. In both cases the most concentration were between the 7 and 10 values, showing that most of the people in the survey tend to not consume a lot of beer and wine thorughout the year.

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Week 2- First Program

The selected variables were the same as the last entry, How often drink beer in the last 12 months, How often drank wine in the last 12 months and Thinking about/being in/avoid social situation upset you/made you feel uncomfortable.

The list were made to analyze the amount of responses obtained in the database and see where is most concentrated. I did not reduce or subset the data anaylzed because i not only want to examine the impact of alcohol consumption, for beer and wine, in the social interaction of people, but also how does the amount consumed afffect it.

The data was organized ina way that the values with more data or more concentrated were displayed first, in order to see how aften did people consume beer and wine in the last 12 months. Resulting in consumption of beer of 2 or 3 times a week, while wine was 2 or 3 times in the last year.

Regarding the social behaviour, the mayority of people indicated that they do not have issues with social interaction.

The blank space at the top of every list refers to the data that had not registered any values. In which every variable choosen is more than 50%. This is another reason why a subset was not made, since the more data we can analyze, the more we can infere and conclude.

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Research question and personal code book

Research question:

Does consuming beer or wine on a regular basis affect your social interactions?

Literature review

Once i read all of the NESARC code book the subject that most interesed me was the consumption of alcohol, specifically beer and wine. According to articles on Google Scholar regarding alcohol consumption, this are two of the most consumed alcoholic beverages worldwide. Different levels of alcohol, especifically ethanol, have the effect to inhibit signaling molecule or neurotransmitter that carry out diffrent aspects of the brain that can affect an individuals behavior for an undefined period of time, depending on the individuals.

While drinking can alter the state of mind for limited periods of time, carrying it out repeatedly can start to affect the core behavior of an individual regarding his social interaction. It can restrict interchage or promote it. Since both wine and beer have different alcohol percentages per volume the effect on an individual drinking the same amount for both beverages can show divergent results.

Code book and variables

The first choosen topic for the asignment was How often drank beer in the last 12 months (S2AQ5B) and How often drank wine in the last 12 months (S2AQ6B). This topics were chosen since they are the most common alcoholic beverages and because here resides most of the data regarding drinking. The second topic selected was if Thinking about/being in/avoid social situation upset you/made you feel uncomfortable (S7Q161), since its known that the consumption of alcoholic beverages can alter ones social interaction.

References

Bennett LA, Campillo C, Chandrashekar CR, Gureje O. Alcoholic beverage consumption in India, Mexico, and Nigeria: a cross-cultural comparison. Alcohol Health Res World. 1998;22(4):243-52. PMID: 15706750; PMCID: PMC6761889.

Sullivan EV, Harris RA, Pfefferbaum A. Alcohol's effects on brain and behavior. Alcohol Res Health. 2010;33(1-2):127-43. PMID: 23579943; PMCID: PMC3625995.

Jennifer L. Monahan , Pamela J. Lannutti, Alcohol as Social Lubricant: Alcohol Myopia Theory, Social Self-Esteem, and Social Interaction, Human Communication Research, Volume 26, Issue 2, April 2000, Pages 175–202, https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1468-2958.2000.tb00755.x