There is growing evidence that college student binge drinking contributes to a host of negative consequences (e.g., fatal accidents, AIDS-related sexual behavior). In cooperation with the Dean of Students and the Student Health Center, the current research will test the efficacy of a brief, moderation management approach to reducing heavy episodic drinking and related problems among alcohol-related disciplinary referrals at a large public university. The program targets individual motivation, outcome expectancies, peer influence, and behavioral skills in a group psycho-educational format. Like prevention programs on many college campuses, the Lifestyle Management Class (LMC) has been offered for over a decade, it utilizes peer advisors and student health center staff to provide the program, and it has not been evaluated through controlled research. Cost-effectiveness of this program will be examined by testing delivery of the program by undergraduate peer advisors and Masters level paid staff. The LMC wait list controls and a matched community sample will serve as comparison groups. Pretest, post-test, and one-year follow-up surveys will assess changes in drinking, physical and social consequences, driving after drinking, unsafe sexual practices, and sexual assault. A subset of participants who are of legal drinking age will also complete pre-and post-test laboratory assessments that examine the acute effects of alcohol intoxication. In controlled experimental studies, the effects of program participation will be tested on post-drinking cognitive processes and behavioral skills that mediate decisions to drink heavily and to engage in other potentially dangerous post-drinking behavior. Unlike previous prevention research in which effectiveness is evaluated only when participants are sober, this research offers the opportunity to generalize effects of the program to individuals who have consumed alcohol. Thus, the research will quantify cognitive mechanisms that underlie post-drinking behavior and identify cognitive processes that may be changed.
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