Preventing College Alcohol Abuse

Scott Walters, Ph.D., assistant professor, health promotion and behavioral sciences, School of Public Health Dallas Regional Campus

Scott Walters, Ph.D.

A month into “back-to-school” time, some college students already face a severe drinking problem. According to the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism (NIAAA), excessive drinking contributes to 1,700 student deaths and 97,000 cases of sexual assault and date rape reported annually.

“Alcohol use has been a persistent problem at many American universities,” said Scott Walters, Ph.D. “While, on average, college students drink only slightly more than older adults, young drinkers are more likely to bunch their drinks together in heavy episodes.”

This “binge drinking” leads to disastrous consequences – lower grade point averages, higher rates of intoxicated driving, a greater incidence of violence, and a substantial economic cost to colleges and the community.

“In response, colleges have instituted prevention and intervention programs ranging from universal efforts targeting the entire student body to selective programs for students who have already evidenced problems with alcohol,” Walters explained. His research identifies effective prevention and intervention programs and aids institutions in implementing them.

Walters focuses on helping people change addictive and other problem behaviors. With funding from the NIAAA, he has designed and tested counseling interventions for heavy drinking college students.

“One promising mode of alcohol abuse prevention involves use of the Internet. There has been increasing interest in the use of multimedia technology to provide prevention messages,” Walters said. “The attraction for those who work in college health settings is the possibility of delivering a low-cost, structured intervention to a large number of students.”

College students often use the Internet to research their own health interests. “Students act upon the information they receive: 70 percent of health information seekers discuss it with a friend and 40 percent report changes in health behavior,” Walters said.

His studies are the first of their kind to scientifically evaluate the efficacy of Web-based prevention programs. Walters also helped design two Web-based interventions that are used in hundreds of colleges.

“In addition to information provision, feedback seems to be one of the most consistent features of these automated programs and one that they are uniquely qualified to deliver,” Walters said.

“The limiting factor at this point may be lack of information on what kinds of approaches or information are most effective for what kinds of users. For instance, although we have the ability to tailor information to females, Hispanics or athletes, we know less about what information might be most helpful to what subgroup,” he said. “Because of the tremendous reach of computer and Internet interventions, future studies will need to consider how to best make use of technology to reach larger numbers of students with an effective, individual approach.”

Walters’ current project compares Web-based interventions with two face-to-face counseling approaches. “With the popularity and obvious cost appeal of Web-based interventions,” he said, “the results of this study will help determine whether heavy drinking college students can be effectively treated over the Internet, or whether there is a need for additional in-person contact.”