Examining an Intervention to Reduce High School Drinking

Overview

Underage drinking is a significant problem in the United States. While past research supports the efficacy of interventions in delaying the initiation of alcohol use implemented in middle school and early high school, research shows drinking by older high schoolers is problematic and interventions for older high schoolers remain limited. The current project will test the efficacy of the e-CHECKUP TO GO (eCTG), alone and combined with an electronic-Parent-Based Intervention (ePBI), for junior and senior high school students using a nationally representative sample with the goal of reducing alcohol use and negative consequences.

Prevalence rates of high school alcohol use suggest 61.6% of high school students have used alcohol by their senior year and 1 in 3 students report alcohol use past 30-days. High school risky drinking is associated with negative consequences including impaired neurocognitive functioning, academic problems, hangovers, passing out, unwanted sex, dating violence, suicide attempts, illicit drug use, riding with impaired drivers, and impaired driving. While past research supports the efficacy of interventions in delaying the initiation of alcohol use implemented in middle school and early high school, research shows drinking by older high schoolers is problematic and interventions for older high schoolers remain limited. Implementation with high schoolers has always been difficult to sustain following the completion of the grant funding period due to large costs associated with personnel to hire, train, and supervise teachers and staff to implement interventions with fidelity. As an alternative, brief web-based personalized feedback interventions that do not require staffing or costs to implement to large numbers of students have shown promise (e.g., eCHECKUP TO GO; eCTG). Our preliminary work, including our funded NIAAA R21 study, supporting this proposal has shown eCTG is efficacious in changing normative perceptions of peer drinking frequency and drunkenness, positive alcohol expectancies, and reducing both alcohol use and consequences among high school students. The proposed research will expand on these findings by conducting a randomized controlled trial using the eCHECKUP TO GO (eCTG) alone and combined with an efficacious brief electronic-Parent-Based Intervention on a nationally representative sample of high school juniors and seniors. The design is a two-arm RCT: eCTG and eCTG+. Data collection will occur across 5 waves (pre-intervention baseline, 1-, 3-, 6-, and 9- month follow-ups) for the three intervention arms. In all arms there is one wave for parents (baseline only)