Excessive drinking, defined by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), is for females consuming four or more alcoholic drinks on one occasion and for males five or more drinks one on occasion. For many reasons, first-year college students are among the highest-risk groups for alcohol misuse. A tactic that has been used is providing correct information about actual peer drinking norms, referred to as the social norms approach. This tactic does not always work, so this study explores how parental and peer norms can be related to first-year students’ drinking during typical days and celebratory events.
This study took place in 2019 and consisted of 127 participants from colleges across the US. All participants were ages 18 and 19 and were first-year students. International students were excluded from this study due to the different legal drinking age in many countries. Perceived parental injunctive and peer norms were measured using four items from Park and Smith using 7-point Likert Scales. Attitudes towards moderate drinking and alcohol consumption were also measured. Among these measures, there were different categories for celebration and a typical day. Alcohol consumption was measured using a single item from the Alcohol Use Disorders Identification Test (AUDIT).
The results of the study were different from past findings. Instead, this study suggests that first-year students’ drinking is closely related to peer influence. For example, the results showed that peer descriptive norms on typical days can establish a referent point for drinking behaviors on both regular and special occasions in the future. This study did support what previous studies have shown, that those who face the most negative experiences from celebration drinking are those that drink light on a typical day. This shows the need to target not only heavy drinkers but also typical day light drinkers.
Takeaway: This study and previous study have shown that those who face the most negative experiences from celebration drinking are those that drink light on a typical day, showing the need to target not only heavy drinkers on typical day but also light drinkers.