Likelihood of Young Adult Engagement in Protective Behavioral Strategies for Alcohol Use across Drinking Contexts: Implications for Adaptive Interventions.

OBJECTIVE: This study examined how young adults' likelihood to engage in protective behavioral strategies (PBS) to reduce alcohol harms varies across physical and social contexts for drinking. METHOD: We conducted an online survey with 514 heavy drinking young adults (Mage = 22.4 years, 52% women, 30% Hispanic/Latin(x), 40% non-White). Participants were asked to rate their likelihood to engage in 26 PBS generally, and specifically in six physical contexts (e.g., bar/club), and six social contexts (e.g., in a large group). We conducted regression analyses to examine the overall effect of context on the likelihood to engage in each PBS and post-hoc Tukey tests to assess pairwise comparisons of the differences in likelihood to engage in each PBS across response options for physical and social context. Analyses were conducted using the full sample, and for men and women separately. RESULTS: There were significant differences in six strategies across physical contexts; likelihood to engage in PBS varied across public and private spaces for different strategies. We also found significant differences in five strategies across social contexts; participants were more likely to engage in PBS among larger numbers of people and those who are intoxicated. There were numerous differences in pairwise comparisons of PBS engagement across physical and social contexts for women, while men demonstrated only two differences in PBS across physical context. CONCLUSIONS: Results suggest that alcohol interventions for young adults that include PBS should consider tailoring strategies to the individual and the specific context of the drinking event.

Alcohol protective behavioral strategies for young adults: a content analysis across drinking contexts and gender.

Background: Protective behavioral strategies (PBS) are specific harm reduction behaviors which mitigate alcohol-related consequences among young adults. Prior work indicates PBS utilization varies according to drinking context and gender, suggesting a need for further research assessing whether young adults employ unidentified PBS according to such factors.Objectives: This study examined alcohol PBS young adults suggest using across drinking contexts and gender to inform alcohol-related harm reduction interventions.Methods: An online survey with 514 young adult heavy drinkers (n = 269 female, Mage = 22.36 years) assessed PBS use generally, and across 12 physical and social contexts. We utilized qualitative content analysis methods to code and derive themes from open-ended responses from a prompt asking participants to state additional PBS used per context. The frequency of each theme's appearance was calculated across the overall sample, by gender, and within each context.Results: PBS endorsement varied across context and gender within each theme. Young adults who reported PBS use most frequently endorsed utilizing strategies related to drink content (18.30%), social support (12.36%), and engaging in other activities (10.34%). Participants infrequently endorsed strategies related to awareness of time (0.23%), standards of behavior (0.78%) and avoiding environments (0.87%).Conclusions: Young adults endorse utilizing additional PBS in varying frequency according to drinking context and gender. Given PBS are often a key component of alcohol harm reduction interventions, monitoring trends in young adult PBS use is crucial to ensure continued relevance and efficacy of such interventions to minimize harms associated with young adult heavy alcohol use.

A systematic review of the associations between protective behavioral strategies and heavy alcohol consumption and consequences among young adults.

OBJECTIVE: We systematically reviewed the literature to assess the association between use of alcohol protective behavioral strategies (PBS) and young adult heavy drinking and alcohol-related consequences. METHOD: We followed the preferred reporting items for systematic review and meta-analysis guidelines to select and review research studies that were comprised of a sample of young adults ages 18-26, included PBS derived from one of 10 validated scales as an independent variable, measured heavy alcohol use or alcohol consequences as the dependent variable, and tested the direct association between the two. Studies were gathered via PubMed, Scopus, Cumulative Index to Nursing and Allied Health Literature, APA PsycInfo, and Global Health. All identified study records underwent a two-step screening process and risk of bias assessment. RESULTS: Data were extracted from 94 studies that met inclusion criteria; 16 studies (17%) examined associations with heavy alcohol use and 91 studies (97%) tested effects of PBS on alcohol consequences. All studies that measured a total effect of PBS use (summations across all strategies) found significant negative associations with heavy alcohol use and 91% were negatively associated with alcohol consequences. Most studies that examined subscales of PBS found at least one significant, negative relation with heavy alcohol use (73%) and alcohol-related consequences (78%), though effects varied across type of subscale (e.g., manner of drinking). CONCLUSIONS: Our results support the use of PBS to address heavy alcohol consumption and related harms among young adults. Opportunities for refinement of current PBS in preventive interventions are discussed. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2024 APA, all rights reserved).