Collegiate Drinking: Administrator Perceptions, Campus Policies, and Student Behaviors

Young adult's immediate reaction to a personal alcohol overdose

Following an emergency medical transport for alcohol overdose, first-year college students were asked to complete a survey assessing their reactions to the transport experience, their assessment of why they required this emergency response, and plans for future personal alcohol consumption. Transported students who responded to a baseline survey of all first-year students regarding expectations about alcohol are compared to first-year students overall. The 50 first-year transported students did not perceive themselves at risk for alcohol overdose prior to the event and were typically not heavy consumers of alcohol. The majority attributed the overdose event to bad decision making. Most students planned to alter the amount and the pace of their future alcohol consumption. Additional education on the circumstances of alcohol overdose may help young adults learn their own limits for safe consumption.

Impact of perceived second-hand consequences related to alcohol use on college students' drinking behavior intent: a test of feasibility

This article presents the results of an experiment designed to determine the impact of a group discussion about second-hand consequences of alcohol use on college students' intentions to consume alcohol. Participants were students enrolled in two large Community Health courses at a large Midwestern university (n = 184). After randomization of class sections into an intervention or a control group, intervention group students participated in a class discussion on the negative consequences college students experience as a result of other students' drinking behavior, prior to answering survey questions regarding their drinking behavior intent. Compared to controls who completed the questionnaire only, intervention group participants reported intent to limit themselves to fewer drinks per drinking occasion (p = .003) and fewer drinks per week (p = .004). The effects of the brief educational intervention were analyzed using structural equation modeling, to test the feasibility of a hypothesized intervention mechanism.

Predictors of college students' alcohol consumption: implications for student education

Understanding why young adults consume alcohol the way they do can lead to more effective educational programming for promotion of students' personal health and safety. The authors examined the predictive role of expectations about alcohol, perceived peer norms of consumption, awareness of rules, and individual self-efficacy in conjunction with demographic variables for male and female college students' weekly alcohol consumption. The sample of 4,960 students analyzed here is 10 to 20 times larger and more nationally representative than the samples used in similar studies. The authors used a general linear model; 41% of the men's variance and 33% of the women's variance in self-reported weekly alcohol consumption were explained by the set of predictors. In descending order of variance accounted for in male and female students' self-reported weekly alcohol consumption, perceived gender-specific norms of consumption, expectations about the effects of alcohol, and the importance of drinking in high school were significant predictors for both men and women. The salience of psychological variables for young adults' consumption of alcohol underscores the importance of recognizing individual predictors of behavior in the broader ecological context in which those behaviors are performed.

Interactive multimedia preventive alcohol education: a technology application in higher education

This article summarizes the process of implementation and short-term impact on knowledge and attitudes of an interactive multimedia software program on preventive alcohol education for young adults. The three factors related to behavioral change addressed in the software are self-efficacy in maintaining personal control and safety while using alcohol, attitudes and related expectations regarding the physiological and behavioral consequences of alcohol consumption, and peer norms regarding alcohol consumption. As compared to alternative alcohol education and a no-alcohol education groups, students using the interactive computer lesson reported learning more about dose-response and ways to intervene with friends in peril. The article concludes with consideration of the import of this technology for informing students about the consequences of alcohol use, and the utility to higher education institutions of using this technology in an era when pressures increase for due diligence around student safety but with few additional institutional resources.