It's Not All Smoke and Mirrors: The Role of Social Norms, Alcohol Use, and Pandemic Partying in e-Cigarette Use During COVID-19.

BACKGROUND: E-cigarette use among college students is increasing. In the era of COVID-19, such usage is especially dangerous given that the virus can be deadly for those with impaired respiratory systems. A small but growing body of research suggests that social norms may predict e-cigarette use. However, one's perception of e-cigarette use behaviors (descriptive norms) and approval by peers (injunctive norms) have yet to be studied in college students. The overarching purpose of this study is to determine whether descriptive and injunctive norms for e-cigarette use contribute unique variance to past 30-day e-cigarette use. Methods: Using a sample of 191 students (138 women) surveyed from introductory-level courses at a university in the northeastern United States, we explored the relationships between student demographic characteristics, alcohol use, binge drinking, COVID-19 non-compliant party attendance on and off campus, and social norms with past 30-day e-cigarette use using sequential regression. Two models were utilized to determine if descriptive and injunctive e-cigarette use norms predicted e-cigarette use after controlling for demographic characteristics in the social norms model, and above and beyond demographics and COVID-19 noncompliant party attendance, alcohol use, and binge drinking in the party behaviors model. Results: The results demonstrated that descriptive and injunctive norms for e-cigarette use significantly predicted e-cigarette use in both models, controlling for all covariates. Conclusions/Importance: Findings highlight the importance of social norms in predicting e-cigarette use during the COVID-19 pandemic, identifying areas for prevention and intervention for public health officials and higher education administrators.

Going against the Norm: A Mixed Methods Analysis of College Students' Arguments against the College Drinking Culture.

College alcohol beliefs (e.g. "College is a time for experimentation with alcohol") are highly predictive of heavy drinking and its consequences. Yet, current college alcohol interventions do not address this belief system even though researchers have recommended that these beliefs be targeted.Using a mixed methods approach, we conducted two studies to generate arguments against the college drinking culture and to evaluate the effectiveness of such arguments.In Study 1, freshman students (N = 104, 65% women) wrote an essay to a fictitious roommate presenting arguments against the college drinking culture. Responses were reliably coded into a 19-category scheme. The most common arguments included that (1) one's focus should be on academics, (2) drinking will lead to academic consequences, and (3) drinking is not a rite of passage in college. In Study 2, college students (N = 488) rated the effectiveness of prototype arguments drawn from each Study 1 category. According to their ratings, the most effective arguments were that (1) one's focus should be on academics, (2) drinking could have a negative impact on one's career, and (3) one could do potential harm to others.The student-generated arguments against the college drinking culture identified in his research have inherent ecological validity and will help inform the development of new interventions to counter such beliefs. We offer suggestions for translating our findings into clinical interventions.The problem of college student drinking has been long-standing (Kilmer et al., 2014) and remains a significant public health issue today (Hingson et al., 2017). Decades of research on college student drinking and its consequences have identified key cognitive factors that underlie drinking and its consequences, such as the misperception of norms for drinking (Borsari & Carey, 2003) and the positive expectancies students hold about the effects of drinking (Jones et al., 2001; Monk & Heim, 2013). The robust relationships between these cognitive variables and alcohol consumption among college students have led to the development of interventions that target these variables. Social norms marketing campaigns (DeJong et al., 2006), personalized normative feedback (Lewis & Neighbors, 2006), and expectancy challenge techniques (Scott-Sheldon et al., 2012) have been a part of interventions designed to correct students' misperceptions about the percentage of and amount students drink and the effects that alcohol has on their functioning in social situations. Reviews of the literature have demonstrated that interventions containing these components are effective for first year students (Scott-Sheldon et al., 2014) and mandated students (Carey et al., 2016), except for interventions targeting student members of Greek letter organizations (Scott-Sheldon et al., 2016). Effect sizes in most interventions across freshman and mandated students tend to be modest and not very durable in the long-term (Carey et al., 2016; Scott-Sheldon et al., 2014). However, recent research reveals that a variety of new intervention strategies may be useful in addressing the problem of college student drinking (Dunn et al., 2020; Kazemi et al., 2020; King et al., 2020; Magill et al., 2017; Pedrelli et al., 2020; Young & Neighbors, 2019). Aside from social norms and positive alcohol expectancies, another cognitive variable has been found to be a very robust predictor, mediator, and moderator of college student drinking and its consequences - college alcohol beliefs (Crawford & Novak, 2006; Osberg et al., 2010).

"This is the way we were raised": Alcohol beliefs and acculturation in relation to alcohol consumption among Native Americans.

Native Americans have the highest rates of alcohol use in comparison to other ethnic groups, placing them at risk for experiencing alcohol-related problems. The present study examined the beliefs that some Native Americans may have related to alcohol use; specifically, the belief that alcohol is a key component in Native American cultures. To assess these beliefs, we developed the Stereotypical Alcohol Beliefs Scale for Native Americans (SABSNA). The new 20-item measure was administered to 144 individuals who identified as Native American along with a measure of acculturation and other drinking-related measures, including perceived norms, alcohol expectancies, and drinking motives. An exploratory factor analysis revealed that the measure is unidimensional in structure and has excellent internal consistency. SABSNA scores were found to be positively associated with typical week drinking, alcohol expectancies, and drinking motives (social, coping, enhancement, and conformity). Hierarchical regression analyses revealed that level of acculturation moderated the association between alcohol beliefs and weekly drinking. Native Americans who identified less with mainstream culture demonstrated a positive association between their cultural alcohol beliefs and their weekly drinking. The findings suggest that alcohol beliefs would be an appropriate additional target for interventions for individuals who are not oriented to the mainstream culture.

Dangerous Beliefs: College Alcohol Beliefs Are Associated With Increased Risk of Regretted Sexual Encounters.

This study explored the relative impact of college alcohol beliefs (CABs; i.e., the extent to which the student views alcohol as part of the fabric of college life), descriptive norms, injunctive norms, positive alcohol expectancies, and sensation seeking on college students' (N = 415) risk for engaging in regretted sexual encounters (RSE). Overall, 12% of our sample reported having experienced RSE within the past 30 days. When pitted against the other traditional predictors of college student drinking and its consequences, such as positive alcohol expectancies, descriptive and injunctive norms, and sensation seeking, CABs emerged as the strongest correlate of RSE other than drinking itself, and explained significant additional variance in RSE beyond these other predictors. Mediation analyses revealed that CABs had a significant indirect effect on RSE through typical weekly drinking. This pattern of findings indicates that college alcohol beliefs are, from a public health perspective, dangerous beliefs, that warrant serious consideration in the development of new approaches to college student drinking and its consequences.

Partying during a pandemic: role of descriptive partying norms, residence, college alcohol beliefs, and political ideology in COVID-19 party behavior.

OBJECTIVE: Non-adherence to COVID-19 guidelines is a major public health issue. This study explored factors that explain college student party behavior (PB; defined as attending a college party wherein COVID-19 guidelines, including masks and social distancing were ignored) during the pandemic. METHOD: Freshmen students at a northeastern university (N = 207; 72% women) responded to an online Fall 2020 semester survey. RESULTS: The percentage of students who participated in on-campus partying during past month was 11.6%, with 20.3% participating in off-campus partying. Living on campus and higher perceived norms for partying were associated with higher levels of on-campus PB, whereas higher perceived norms for partying, stronger college alcohol beliefs, and a more conservative political ideology accounted for significant variance in off-campus PB. CONCLUSIONS: Efforts to reduce party behavior should target misperception of party behavior norms as well as college alcohol beliefs, and take into account students' residence and political ideology.

The Irrational Food Beliefs Scale: development and validation.

This article reports the development and validation of a measure of Irrational Food Beliefs (IFB), defined as cognitively distorted and unhealthy attitudes and beliefs pertaining to food, which is proposed to be a factor that undermines success at weight loss and maintenance. Studies 1 and 2 demonstrated that the Irrational Food Beliefs Scale (IFBS) contains ecologically valid items and is comprised of two primary factors (irrational and rational food beliefs) whose items are internally consistent. Study 3 established that irrational subscale scores were positively associated with first semester weight gain in college freshmen. In Study 4, irrational food belief scores related predictably to measures of recent weight gain, poor weight loss maintenance, and bulimic symptoms in another college sample. In addition, IFB scores were not unduly influenced by test-taking response sets, and they were positively associated with depression and phobic anxiety and negatively correlated with self-esteem and need for cognition. Study 5 revealed strong positive associations between irrational food beliefs and bulimic symptoms, as well as number of previous diets in an obese community sample. The role irrational food beliefs may play in poor weight loss outcomes and maintenance is discussed.

The MMPI-2 Clinical Scales and Restructured Clinical (RC) Scales: comparative psychometric properties and relative diagnostic efficiency in young adults.

We examined the psychometric properties of the Restructured Clinical (RC) scales (Tellegen et al., 2003) of the MMPI-2 (Butcher, Dahlstrom, Graham, Tellegen, & Kaemmer, 1989) in a large sample (N = 744) of 18-year-old college freshman. We found that the RC scales demonstrated good convergence with their Clinical scale counterparts and were more distinctive than the Clinical scales. The patterns of discriminant correlations for the RC scales were slightly clearer than those of the Clinical scales and a set of other existing MMPI-2 scales. Diagnostic efficiency statistics based on Clinical and RC scale elevation status did not differ appreciably. However, the diagnostic efficiency statistics of cutoff scores derived from mean RC and Clinical scale T scores improved on the traditional scale elevation measures. We consider the clinical implications of these findings.

College alcohol beliefs and drinking consequences: A multiple mediation analysis of norms, expectancies, and willingness to experience drinking consequences.

OBJECTIVE: We explored the potential mediating role of willingness to experience drinking consequences and other traditional alcohol outcome predictors (descriptive norms, injunctive norms, positive alcohol expectancies) in explaining the association between college alcohol beliefs 1 (CABs) and the actual experience of drinking consequences among college students. PARTICIPANTS: The sample consisted of 415 college students tested in October 2014. METHODS: Participants responded to an online survey. RESULTS: When compared to both types of norms and positive alcohol expectancies, CABs demonstrated the strongest associations to both willingness to experience drinking consequences and actual drinking consequences among college students. A multiple mediation analysis revealed that the impact of CABs on students' actual drinking consequences was mediated only through their willingness to experience drinking consequences. CONCLUSIONS: Students' college alcohol beliefs and their corresponding willingness to experience drinking consequences should be targeted in prevention and intervention programs designed to address the problem of college student drinking.

Comparative accuracy of the MMPI-2 and the MMPI-A in the diagnosis of psychopathology in 18-year-olds.

Both the Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory--2 (MMPI-2) and the Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory--Adolescent (MMPI-A) may be administered to 18-year-olds. Each test was administered to 18-year-old participants classified as psychopathology present (PP) or psychopathology absent (PA) to assess (a) the degree of correspondence between the 2 test versions in yielding clinically elevated or nonclinically elevated profiles and (b) the relative accuracy of the 2 test versions in identifying the presence of psychopathology. The 2 tests produced profiles that were inconsistent in clinical elevation status in 70 of 152 participants (46%). All 70 participants with incongruent profiles had clinically elevated MMPI-2 scores and normal-range MMPI-A scores. Analyses of incongruent profiles obtained by PP and PA participants indicated that 18-year-olds were overpathologized by the MMPI-2 and underpathologized by the MMPI-A.

Direct and indirect effects of stress on bulimic symptoms and BMI: the mediating role of irrational food beliefs.

OBJECTIVE: To test the possible mediating role of irrational food beliefs (IFBs) in the connection between stress and bulimic symptoms and BMI in a subclinical population. METHODS: Participants were college students (N=356) administered measures of daily hassles, IFBs, and bulimic symptoms. Simple mediation analyses using bootstrapping methods were performed to examine the potential direct effects of stress, and indirect effects of stress through IFBs, on bulimic symptoms and BMI. RESULTS: Daily hassles exerted a direct effect on bulimic symptoms, but not on BMI. Indirect effects of daily hassles, through IFBs, on both bulimic symptoms and BMI were observed. The pattern of results was not altered when gender was included in the models as a covariate. CONCLUSIONS: The findings support a cognitive mediation model of the effects of stress on eating disorder symptoms and body mass through irrational food beliefs in both men and women.

From Animal House to Old School: a multiple mediation analysis of the association between college drinking movie exposure and freshman drinking and its consequences.

Does exposure to college drinking movies impact upon subsequent college student drinking? If so, what mechanisms mediate such an effect? In the first study to address these questions, we assessed college drinking movie exposure in a sample of 479 college freshmen early in their first semester and examined its relation to subsequent drinking and drinking consequences one month later. Hypothesized mediators of this effect included college alcohol beliefs (beliefs that drinking is central to college life), positive and negative alcohol expectancies, and descriptive and injunctive norms. Using bootstrapping procedures, results indicated that movie exposure exerted direct effects on both drinking and drinking consequences. Movie exposure also had significant indirect effects on drinking through all of the hypothesized mediators, with the exception of negative alcohol expectancies. All mediated movie exposure's effects on drinking consequences, with the exception of injunctive norms. Contrast analyses revealed that college alcohol beliefs had the strongest mediational effects in the relationship between movie exposure and both drinking and consequences. The implications of these findings for precollege alcohol education programs are discussed.

Incremental validity of college alcohol beliefs in the prediction of freshman drinking and its consequences: a prospective study.

Osberg et al. (2010) recently developed the College Life Alcohol Salience Scale (CLASS), which assesses the extent to which students identify with the college drinking culture. Using a prospective design, we explored the incremental and predictive validity of the new measure in a sample of 479 college freshmen. Scores obtained on the new measure at Time 1 demonstrated strong positive associations with concurrently assessed drinking patterns and alcohol consequences, as well as those collected at Time 2 1 month later. The college alcohol beliefs measured by the CLASS also explained significant additional variance in drinking and its consequences at Time 2 beyond that accounted for by gender, perceived descriptive and injunctive norms, and positive and negative alcohol expectancies. Moreover, CLASS scores predicted typical drinking levels and alcohol consequences at Time 2, even when baseline levels of these drinking indices were controlled. Potential future lines of research with the CLASS are discussed.

Development and validation of the College Life Alcohol Salience Scale: a measure of beliefs about the role of alcohol in college life.

This article reports the development and validation of the College Life Alcohol Salience Scale (CLASS), which assesses college students' beliefs about the centrality of alcohol to the college experience. Developed using procedures designed to increase its ecological validity, the CLASS was administered to three samples of college students (total N = 571). Its unidimensional factor structure was first established via exploratory factor analysis and parallel analysis on one sample and then verified via confirmatory factor analysis on a separate sample. Scores on the CLASS were predictably related to a nomological network of drinking and personality variables and it provided incremental validity in accounting for drinking frequency and amount, when added to drinking motive scores. The importance of assessing and developing interventions to target the types of beliefs measured by the CLASS is discussed.