Exploring University Students’ Alcohol Consumption, Consequences, Motives, and Protective Behavioural Strategies during Re-Orientation Week and the Semester

Problematic alcohol consumption is an issue for university students around the world and there is growing interest in interventions targeting student drinking. To date, however, these interventions show limited effectiveness in reducing student drinking. Exploring student’s motives for consuming alcohol (e.g., social motives) and their use of protective behavioural strategies (e.g., alternating alcoholic and non-alcoholic drinks) may provide valuable insights that can help shape future targeted interventions. To this end, the overall aim of the current study was to investigate the relationships between alcohol consumption, alcohol-related consequences, drinking motives, and protective behavioural strategy use. Further, given student drinking fluctuates throughout the academic year, we also investigated how the relationships between these variables differed during three distinct time points (Re-Orientation Week, the middle of the semester, and the end of semester - a period just prior to and encompassing exams). Participants were 82 University of Otago psychology students who completed surveys at the end of Semester 1, at the end of Re-Orientation Week and in the middle of Semester 2. Consistent with previous research on event-specific drinking, alcohol consumption and negative alcohol related consequences were highest during Re-Orientation Week. With respect to motives, social and enhancement motives were the main reasons why students consumed alcohol but the relationship between alcohol consumption, consequences, and motives differed across the three time points. The use of protective behavioural strategies, and their relationship with consumption and consequences, also differed across the three time points. These findings highlight the fact that, rather than taking a uniform approach across the academic year, interventions may be more effective if they target specific motives and protective behavioural strategies at specific points during the academic year