Interlinking alcohol intake, mental stress, psychotic experiences and job performance of higher institutions' graduates: A structural equation modelling

Graduates’ job performance has become a matter that needs urgent attention. This is because many stakeholders are increasingly becoming interested in understanding the extent schools are able to produce output that meets the yearnings of society. Along these lines, we examined the contributions of alcohol intake to the job performance of higher education graduates while treating mental stress and psychotic experiences as mediators in the nexus.

The study's population comprised all the graduates of higher education institutions in Nigeria between 2015 and 2020. Data were collected from a virtual cross‑section of 3,862 graduates who self‑reported to have taken alcohol in the past. These participants responded to an electronic questionnaire that was mailed to them. The scale content validity for clarity and relevance were 0.90 and 0.88, respectively, while the Cronbach alpha reliability estimate of the instrument is 0.86.

Amongst many others, key findings indicate that alcohol intake, mental stress and psychotic experiences jointly made a significant negative contribution to the overall job performance of graduates (R2 = 0.256, 95% confidence interval (CI) [0.23, 0.28], P = 0.00). Mental stress (B = −0.09, β = −0.14, z = −4.45, 95%CI [−0.24, −0.05], P = 0.00) and psychotic experiences (B = −0.26, β = −0.43, z = −8.07, 95%CI [−0.68, −0.16], P = 0.01) have significant negative contributions to graduates’ job performance, respectively. Alcohol intake and mental stress jointly predict the psychotic experiences of graduates (B = −0.26, β = −0.43, z = −8.07, 95%CI [−0.68, −0.16], P = 0.01). Alcohol intake has a positive contribution to the mental stress of graduates (R2 = 0.797, 95%CI [0.77, 0.825], P = 0.01). Mental stress and psychotic experiences jointly mediated the relationship between alcohol intake and graduates’ job performance.

It was concluded that high intake of alcohol and high levels of mental stress and psychotic experiences significantly reduce graduates’ job performance generally and in specific aspects. Alcohol intake can increase graduates’ job performance to a small extent depending on the amount consumed.