The long-term goal of this project is to reduce aggression in bars. Alcohol is known to be associated with aggression, and bars in particular are drinking contexts where the risk of aggression and injury is high. Therefore, reducing aggression in bars is a serious social and health concern. Responsible Beverage Service training has demonstrated success in reducing overserving, but an intervention is needed that focuses specifically on preventing aggression. The proposed research involves a randomized control study of the effects of the Safer Bars intervention on reducing aggression. The intervention consists of two components: (1) Risk Assessment -a comprehensive assessment of environmental and other factors in the bar that increase the risk of aggression; and (2) Bar Staff Training -a training program for bar owners, managers and staff on preventing and managing problem behavior. A pool of 100 bars will be selected for the study (with 50 randomly assigned to the Safer Bars intervention). With an expected recruitment rate of 50 percent, the design will include 25 experimental bars, 25 """"""""refusal"""""""" bars and 50 control bars. The effects of the intervention will be assessed through unobtrusive observations by researchers at baseline and two posttests., as well as by police records of calls for service, occurrence and arrests over the study period. The intervention is hypothesized to affect aggression as follows: (1) risk assessment consultation with owners and training of bar staff-(2) plans by owners to reduce risk factors and changes in knowledge and attitudes among staff following the training-(3) changes in the physical and social environment of the bar and changes in staff behavior in the bar-(4) reduced aggression. The study will involve both outcome(effects of the Safer Bars intervention on rate of physical aggression) and process (monitoring the delivery of the intervention, the extent that the risk assessment leads to plans to reduce risks, and pre-post training knowledge and attitude change) evaluation. If the Safer Bars intervention is demonstrated to be effective in reducing barroom aggression, the results could have a broad impact on bars in North America. Secondary Objective. Because evaluation of the intervention requires the collection of a large database on bar aggression and associated situational variables, secondary analyses of the data are planned to explore the role of the following in aggressive behavior: the effects of alcohol; females; bar staff; and routine activities.
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