Friends’ behavior, attitudes, and adolescent substance use: unpacking the moderating role of unstructured socializing

While deviant peer association is a well-established predictor of adolescent deviance, its variability across situational contexts has received relatively little empirical scrutiny. This study examines whether time spent in unstructured socializing moderates the relationship between deviant peer association and adolescent substance use, focusing on friends’ substance use and attitudes toward substance use as its behavioral and attitudinal dimensions. Using data from the 2019 Florida Youth Substance Abuse Survey (N = 8,938), this study finds that unstructured socializing conditions the relationship between deviant peer association and adolescent substance use, although the moderating patterns do not emerge consistently across all levels. More time spent in unstructured socializing is generally associated with a stronger positive relationship between friends’ substance use and adolescent substance use. By contrast, friends’ attitudes toward substance use show a more complex pattern, in which the association shifts from negative to positive with more time spent in unstructured socializing. Findings point to the potential value of early interventions targeting deviant peer association in unstructured socializing contexts.