The long-term goals of the proposed research trajectory are twofold: (1) to better understand how social media potentially shapes and redefines students' drinking norms, (2) and to utilize this knowledge in order to develop and implement a social media-specific personalized normative feedback (SMPNF) intervention targeting the reduction of drinking among heavy drinking students. These overarching goals will be achieved via a 5-year training plan consisting of two mentored years and three years of independent research. Primary objectives of the training plan will include: 1) gaining experience in coding alcohol-related content (ARC) on social media, 2) creation and validation of two ARC-related self-report instruments, 3) obtaining base rate information for ARC utilizing the new self-report measure, 4) developing a strong foundation in the field of alcohol research with an emphasis in intervention development, 5) acquiring necessary statistical skills in the creation of assessment instruments and hierarchal linear modeling in order to test intervention hypotheses, and 6) cultivating greater proficiency in grant writing. Dr. Steers will meet regularly with members of her mentoring team who possess extensive expertise in the areas directly relevant to the research proposal: 1) alcohol-related personalized feedback interventions among college populations (Dr. Neighbors), 2) ARC posted to Facebook (Dr. Moreno), and 3) statistical expertise (Dr. Wickham). The timing and structure of the training plan has been carefully organized and integrated to concur with the implementation of the SMPNF intervention. In the K99 mentored phase, two self-report measures will be constructed, psychometrically evaluated, and refined which assess: 1) positive and negative evaluations surrounding ARC, and 2) participants' self-reported frequency/categories in which they and their friends posted ARC. The latter measure will be correlated with the ARC contained on a stratified (based on how much participants report drinking) subsample of 240 of 500 participants' Facebook walls. The first year of the R00 phase will be dedicated to assessing base rates of drinking and Facebook ARC using the ARC frequency/category measure developed in the K99 phase. These base rates will be used to generate part of feedback that participants receive in the SMPNF intervention to be conducted in the second and third years of the R00 phase. Participants will be randomly assigned to one of four conditions: 1) SMPNF only, 2) alcohol-related personalized normative feedback (APNF) only, 3) APNF + SMPNF, and 4) attention control. The proposed research is both timely and consistent with the NIAAA's mission of exploring the intersection of social media and drinking. Upon securing a tenure track position at the R00 institution, Dr. Steers plans to utilize the knowledge gained from the planned studies in order to conceive her first independent R01 NIAAA proposal as principle investigator in order to further this line of research.
Heavy drinking among college students remains a critical public health concern. This line of research will contribute to a greater understanding as to how and why alcohol-related posts on Facebook influence students' drinking norms. The goal would be to utilize this information in order to devise a social media-specific personalized normative feedback intervention, which draws attention to misperceptions related to these alcohol-related posts, in order to target the reduction of drinking among heavy drinking students who are also heavy consumers of social media.
