Drinking before drinking: Pregaming and drinking games in mandated students☆
Section snippets
Drinking before drinking: Pregaming and drinking games in mandated students
More than 2 out of 3 college students report consuming alcohol in the past month (O'Malley & Johnston, 2002). Though daily drinking is quite low (5%), approximately 31% of the 8 million college students in the U.S. meet the diagnostic criteria for alcohol abuse (Knight et al., 2002). The most commonly used indicator of problem drinking is heavy episodic drinking (defined as 5 or more drinks on one occasion in the past 2 weeks for men; 4 or more drinks for women; NIAAA, 2004). College students
Setting
The project was conducted at a four-year, private liberal arts university located in the Northeast. The school has an enrollment of 3300 undergraduates (15% minority, 51% female). Most (79%) undergraduate students live on campus. There are no fraternities or sororities.
Participants and recruitment
Participants for this study were enrolled in a randomized controlled trial of students referred for mandatory alcohol intervention following an alcohol policy violation (see Borsari, O'Leary Tevyaw, Barnett, Kahler, & Monti, 2007
Analysis plan
To learn more about the prevalence of pregaming in mandated students, we first examined the prevalence of pregaming among on the night of their referral. Then, we compared the students who reported pregaming on the night of their referral with those who did not to identify which characteristics were associated with pregaming. Identical analyses were conducted with drinking game participants in order to examine how drinking game participants differed from those who did not participate in
Discussion
To our knowledge, this is the first published research study to examine pregaming in college students, as well as the first to examine the intersection between pregaming, drinking games, and the level of intoxication on the night of an alcohol violation. Of particular interest is that approximately one-third of the students reported engaging in pregaming on the event night. Such a high prevalence of pregaming in a single assessment supports findings of previous research (in which two-thirds of
References (44)
- et al.
Mandatory alcohol intervention for alcohol-abusing college students: A systematic review
Journal of Substance Abuse Treatment
(2005) - et al.
Estimating blood alcohol concentration: Two computer programs and their application in therapy and research
Addictive Behaviors
(1979) - et al.
Harm reduction and individually focused alcohol prevention
International Journal of Drug Policy
(2006) - et al.
Drinking game participation among college students: Gender and ethnic implications
Addictive Behaviors
(2006) - et al.
Wired for wellness: e-interventions for addressing college drinking
Journal of Substance Abuse Treatment
(2005) - et al.
Feedback interventions for college alcohol misuse: What, why and for whom?
Addictive Behaviors
(2005) Reductions of alcohol-related harm on United States college campuses: The use of personal feedback interventions
International Journal of Drug Policy
(2006)- et al.
Subjective evaluations of alcohol expectancies and their relevance to drinking game involvement in female college students
Journal of Adolescent Health
(2005) - et al.
Drinking games in female college students: More than just a game?
Addictive Behaviors
(2006) - et al.
Changes over one semester in drinking game playing and alcohol use and problems in a college student sample
Substance Abuse
(1999)
Brief intervention for heavy-drinking college students: 4-year follow-up and natural history
American Journal of Public Health
Brief alcohol interventions with mandated or adjudicated students
Alcoholism: Clinical and Experimental Research
“I'll never drink like that again”: Characteristics of alcohol-related incidents and predictors of motivation to change in college students
Journal of Studies on Alcohol
Alcohol use and related harm among older teenagers treated in an Emergency Room: The importance of alcohol and college status
Journal of Studies on Alcohol
Colleges crack down on preparty drinking
Boston Globe
Drinking games in the college environment: A review
Journal of Alcohol and Drug Education
Effects of a brief motivational intervention with college student drinkers
Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology
Two brief alcohol interventions for mandated college students
Psychology of Addictive Behaviors
Stepped care for mandated college students: A pilot study
The American Journal on Addictions
Drinking games and problems related to drinking among moderate and heavy drinkers
Psychological Reports
Cited by (129)
Alcohol mixed with energy drinks and aggressive behaviors in adolescents and young adults: A systematic review
2023, Clinical Psychology ReviewSide-loading prevalence and intoxication in the night-time economy
2022, Addictive Behaviors ReportsDrinking to go out or going out to drink? A longitudinal study of alcohol in night-time entertainment districts
2019, Drug and Alcohol Dependence
- ☆
This work was supported by National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism Grants R01-AA015518 to B. Borsari, R01-AA13970 to N. Barnett, and T32-AA07459 to J.T.P Hustad.