Popular Program to Curb Campus Drinking Faulted

Study finds 'social norms' may actually increase consumption

By Amanda Gardner
HealthDay Reporter

WEDNESDAY, July 23 (HealthDayNews) -- An increasingly popular method to reduce alcohol use among college students apparently doesn't work. Worse, it might actually increase consumption in some cases.

The authors of a Harvard study appearing in the July issue of the Journal of Studies on Alcohol found that schools that used the "social norms" marketing approach do not have the desired reduction in drinking.

Proponents of the approach disagree strongly with the findings, however. "By their own admission, the only question that was asked to determine was of administrator or junior administrators, 'Did your school ever use a social norms approach?'" says Michael Haines, director of the National Social Norms Resource Center at the Social Science Research Institute of Northern Illinois University in DeKalb. "I wouldn't be surprised that schools that do lousy social norms don't get good results."

By all accounts, college-age drinking is a problem. One study reports that four in five college students drink alcohol while two in five engage in "heavy episodic use" (also known as binge drinking). College kids seem to binge drink at higher rates than their peers who are not in college.

Needless to say, excessive drinking brings with it various forms of violence, including injuries and vandalism. One set of researchers estimates that 500,000 college students between the ages of 18 and 24 suffer unintentional injuries while under the influence, while 1,400 die each year from such injuries.

The social norms approach assumes that students drink because they think their peers are doing the same and they want to fit in. The problem, according to the approach, is that most students think others are drinking more so they drink in order to keep up. Social norms marketing tries to correct the misperception with messages such as "Most students have five or fewer drinks when they party" distributed on posters, fliers, and other mass media around campus.

The practice has become increasingly widespread, with one survey reporting that almost half of all U.S. four-year, residential colleges and universities have conducted or are conducting social norms campaigns.

Despite the growing popularity and ready adoption, the authors of the current study say there is little empirical data to support the method.

"This is a very popular method. You might say it's long on promise and short on proof," says Henry Wechsler, lead author of the new study and director of the College Alcohol Studies at the Harvard School of Public Health in Boston.

At the same time, Wechsler can understand its appeal. "It's easy. It's cheap. It doesn't hurt anyone," he says. "The schools like it because it says there's less of a problem here than people think. The alcohol industry likes it because it says alcohol is not so much of a problem. It doesn't put the onus on anyone.

"The only problem," he adds, "is that it doesn't seem to work."

Others disagree. "[The study] does not negate in any way the growing body of knowledge in refereed journals as to the effectiveness of social norms, which I am absolutely certain will continue to grow," Haines says. Haines cites 21 articles that he knows of that have shown the effectiveness of social norms programs, and expects more.

Wechsler and his colleagues compared drinking behavior at 57 colleges that used social norms programs for at least one year and 61 institutions that did not. All the institutions were four-year; some were private and some public. Results were based on questionnaires distributed to students, which gauged whether they had been exposed to elements of a social norms program and which then ascertained the students' drinking patterns.

Students were asked about seven indicators of alcohol use: whether they had had any alcohol in the past year; any alcohol in the past month; any binge drinking episodes; and the number of drinks consumed in the prior month (more than 20 or less than 20). For students who had had at least one drink in the past month, the researchers also looked at drinking 10 or more times during the past month; experiencing drunkenness three or more times in the past month; and the usual number of drinks consumed on a drinking occasion.

There were no significant decreases on any of the seven alcohol consumption measures at the schools that had implemented social norms programs. Two measures exhibited increases: the percentage of students who drank alcohol in the past month and the percentage of students consuming 20 or more drinks in the past month.

Wechsler says he was most stunned by the uniformity of the findings. "It's that on all seven measures at different types of schools, regardless of their level of exposure to the program and the number of years of the program, there's no decrease," he says. "That sends a very powerful message."

Wechsler did not study why this might be the case but he does have some theories. "I'm speculating that [social norms programs] normalize drinking in the sense that the messages sent to students on campus are that the average student drinks," he says. "The nuance is how much. He drinks less than five drinks but 'drinks' is in there. Drinking is [considered] an average activity. [The study] also completely ignores the issue of underage drinking."

For Haines, the relative simplicity of social norms is both its strength and its weakness. "It attracts a lot of people as the next flavor of the month and that could be its greatest risk," he says. "It's not easy to change the perceptions of an entire campus body. It takes a lot of work."

"People are caught up in the idea. It's novel and intriguing to them and they immediately jump from one conference or training program to slapping some posters up. That's not social norms," Haines adds. "I'm afraid that may make up the bulk of the schools [in this study]."

Wechsler has other theories as to what might work. "We have found some relationship between price and availability of alcohol on specials, in other words, aspects of the supply," he says. "Colleges can't deal with that by themselves. They have to work with the community. It's not a simple solution. It's a complex solution, and perhaps that's why people are happy to grasp at simple solutions."

More information

For more on college drinking, visit the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism or the American Council on Alcoholism. More on social norms can be found at the National Social Norms Resource Center.

SOURCES: Henry Wechsler, Ph.D., director, College Alcohol Studies, Harvard School of Public Health, Boston; Michael Haines, director, National Social Norms Resource Center, Social Science Research Institute, Northern Illinois University, DeKalb; July 2003 Journal of Studies on Alcohol

College Study Faults Anti-Alcohol Program

The Washington Post - July 24, 2003

An approach to alcohol awareness used by many of the nation's colleges has largely failed in its efforts to curb students' consumption by emphasizing that heavy drinking is not normal, according to a Harvard School of Public Health study released yesterday.

The research, to be published this month in the Journal of Studies on Alcohol, found no decrease in student drinking on campuses that used the method -- a cornerstone of some programs funded by the U.S. Department of Education -- compared with those that did not. In fact, student drinking actually increased in two ways, the study said. "These programs . . . were long on promise but short on proof," said Henry Weschler, director of the College Alcohol Study at Harvard and the lead researcher.

The study highlights the difficulties colleges face in their efforts to reduce drinking in light of a disturbing number of alcohol-related deaths. Last year in the Washington area, a University of Maryland student died of acute alcohol intoxication after a fraternity bid party. In 2000, a Georgetown University student died after hitting his head on the curb outside a bar during an alcohol-fueled brawl.

Those and similar deaths across the country were the result of what Weschler calls "binge drinking," defined as five or more alcoholic beverages in a row for a man and four or more for a woman. A report released last year by the College Alcohol Study found that 44 percent of students binge drink, and colleges have spent millions of dollars targeting the problem.

One popular method involves advertising "socially normal" behavior, such as drinking one bottle of beer rather than the whole case. College students believe that their peers consume more alcohol than they actually do, some researchers have found. The social norms method uses posters and fliers, with follow-ups such as leadership training and campus newspaper articles, to ease perceived peer pressure and expectations.

The Harvard study released yesterday found that 48 percent of the country's four-year colleges use social norms methods in their campaigns to reduce student drinking. At the University of Virginia, a flier with alcohol-related information was posted in every freshman bathroom; the school also trains dorm advisers in social norms methods and began a campus-wide media blitz against heavy drinking, thanks in part to a $400,000 grant from Anheuser-Busch.

"It's challenging [students'] perceptions of what's going on in the university," said Susan Bruce, director of U-Va.'s Center for Alcohol and Substance Education. "We feel like it's making a difference."

But while individual schools may feel as though they are making progress, the Harvard study concluded that, overall, the programs have had negligible impact.

The study examined survey results of the drinking habits of a random sample of students, taken during three different years at 37 colleges that used social norms campaigns and 61 colleges that did not. About 35,000 students responded to each survey. The study controlled for changes in student demographics, and the results are broken down according to the intensity and duration of individual schools' campaigns.

The only significant changes were increases at campuses that used the social norms method, both in the percentage of students who reported consuming alcohol in the past month and in those who reported having 20 or more drinks in a month, Weschler said.

Weschler has long been a critic of social norms campaigns. That has made some researchers wary of the Harvard study, which they say is flawed. "His bias against social norms marketing is really very well known, and I don't think he's prepared to give it a fair test," said William DeJong, director of the Higher Education Center for Alcohol and other Drug Prevention, which helps colleges develop social norm campaigns.

DeJong said Weschler's study failed to determine the quality of each school's campaign. It also did not account for outside factors that may have influenced student drinking, such as changes in school policies.

Alan Berkowitz, a consultant who helped develop the theory behind social norms campaigns, defended its use in colleges to curb drinking. "No one is saying that social norms will solve every problem," he said "but that doesn't mean it's not a valid approach."

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