Neuroscience
There’s a new approach to reducing student drinking that’s based on the finding that most students think all their mates drink loads more than they do, which encourages them to drink more themselves.
‘Social norms’ campaigns aim to reduce student drinking by spreading the word that, actually, the majority of students don’t drink that much. With the jury still out on how effective these campaigns are, Kelly Broadwater and colleagues wanted to investigate the premise behind the approach – the idea that students want to drink more when they believe their peers drink more than they do.
The researchers asked 171 first year students to report how much they drank over the last month; how much they wished they had drunk over the last month; and to estimate how much they thought their peers drank.
Consistent with the social norms approach, 91 per cent of the sample thought their peers drank more than they did. But contrary to the approach, when it came to how much the students wished they had drunk, there was no difference between the students who thought their peers drank more than them, and the students who thought their peers drank less than them.
Moreover, when they were followed up a month later, those students who said earlier that they wished they drank more, actually reported they didn’t drink any more than usual over the following month. It was only the students who said they wanted to drink less, who reported a change, saying that they had indeed drunk less than usual over the ensuing month.
The researchers said more work was needed to clarify the mechanisms behind social norms campaigns, and acknowledged the limitations of their own findings: “Although we found no evidence that our college student participants who perceived their peers were heavier drinkers than themselves desired to increase their drinking, the fact that 91 per cent of participants believed their close friends were heavier drinkers than themselves left us with limited power to detect differences”.
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Broadwater, K., Curtin, L., Martz, D.M. & Zrull, M.C. (2006). College student drinking: Perception of the norm and behavioural intentions. Addictive Behaviours, 31, 632-640.
Post written by Christian Jarrett (@psych_writer) for the BPS Research Digest.
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Neuroscience
Student drinking
There’s a new approach to reducing student drinking that’s based on the finding that most students think all their mates drink loads more than they do, which encourages them to drink more themselves.‘Social norms’ campaigns aim to reduce student drinking by spreading the word that, actually, the majority of students don’t drink that much. With the jury still out on how effective these campaigns are, Kelly Broadwater and colleagues wanted to investigate the premise behind the approach – the idea that students want to drink more when they believe their peers drink more than they do.
The researchers asked 171 first year students to report how much they drank over the last month; how much they wished they had drunk over the last month; and to estimate how much they thought their peers drank.
Consistent with the social norms approach, 91 per cent of the sample thought their peers drank more than they did. But contrary to the approach, when it came to how much the students wished they had drunk, there was no difference between the students who thought their peers drank more than them, and the students who thought their peers drank less than them.
Moreover, when they were followed up a month later, those students who said earlier that they wished they drank more, actually reported they didn’t drink any more than usual over the following month. It was only the students who said they wanted to drink less, who reported a change, saying that they had indeed drunk less than usual over the ensuing month.
The researchers said more work was needed to clarify the mechanisms behind social norms campaigns, and acknowledged the limitations of their own findings: “Although we found no evidence that our college student participants who perceived their peers were heavier drinkers than themselves desired to increase their drinking, the fact that 91 per cent of participants believed their close friends were heavier drinkers than themselves left us with limited power to detect differences”.
___________________________________
Broadwater, K., Curtin, L., Martz, D.M. & Zrull, M.C. (2006). College student drinking: Perception of the norm and behavioural intentions. Addictive Behaviours, 31, 632-640.
Post written by Christian Jarrett (@psych_writer) for the BPS Research Digest.
- They Need To "man Up!" - What Students Who Drink Think Of Those Who Don't
There's a scene in the 2013 comedy film The World's End in which a group of middle-aged old school friends are on a nostalgic pub crawl, yet one of them, Andy Knightly, insists on abstaining from alcohol. "I haven't had a drink for sixteen...
- What's The Link Between Left-handedness And Drinking Behaviour?
Back in the 70's, psychologist Paul Bakan published a short research report in which he noted that among 47 inpatients on an alcoholism ward, 7 were left-handed - more than you'd expect based on the approximate 10-per cent prevalence of left-handedness...
- "never Drink On An Empty Stomach" May Not Be Such Wise Advice After All
Teenagers get a bad press these days. One complaint is that they're forever lurking about getting drunk. Now Erling Moxnes and Lene Jensen have come up with a rather radical proposal based on the idea that teenagers often don't mean to get as...
- The Mere Sight Of Alcohol Impairs Drinkers' Memories
For students who like a tipple or three, the mere sight of a bottle of Jack Daniels can have a detrimental effect on their memory. Dennis Kramer and Stephen Schmidt, who made the observation, said this is probably due to the emotional salience alcohol...
- Hyponatremia
Study Cautions Runners to Limit Their Water Intake The New York Times By GINA KOLATA Published: April 14, 2005 After years of telling athletes to drink as much liquid as possible to avoid dehydration, some doctors are now saying that drinking too much...