Research on Brief Interventions

Many early interventions combine several evidence-based strategies to target individual AOD use. A Call to Action: Changing the Culture of Drinking at U.S. Colleges outlines effective strategies for reducing AOD use in at-risk or alcohol dependent college students. These three strategies are summarized below: combining cognitive-behavioral skills with norms clarification and motivational enhancement interventions, offering brief motivational enhancement interventions, and challenging alcohol expectancies.

1. Combining cognitive behavioral skills with norms clarification and motivational enhancement:

• Cognitive behavioral skills training changes an individual’s beliefs and thinking about alcohol use using activities, such as changing alcohol expectancies, documenting consumption, and managing stress.
• Norms clarification interventions change students’ perceptions by providing them with data to counter their beliefs about the acceptability of drinking behavior on college campuses.
• Motivational enhancement is combined with the previous two strategies to increase the student’s motivation or desire to change his/her behavior. Interventions with a motivational enhancement component include non-judgmental and non-confrontational feedback about an individual student’s drinking behavior as compared with others’ behavior and the negative consequences of his/her own behavior. (NIAAA, 2002; Larimer & Cronce, 2002)

2. Brief motivational enhancement interventions: Alcohol consumption can be reduced by providing a student with brief personalized non-confrontational feedback regarding his/her drinking. (Dimeff et al, 1999; Marlatt et al, 1998; Baer et al 2001) The major difference between this strategy and the multi-component intervention described above is the session’s duration, which is typically no more than one or two sessions.

3. Challenging alcohol expectancies: This strategy refutes myths that alcohol can yield positive physical and social outcomes by using both information and experimental learning techniques. This strategy has been demonstrated to be effective, especially with college males over short periods of time. (NIAAA, 2002; Darkes & Goldman 1998)

The strategies also may be effective in reducing college students’ use of marijuana. (Lang et al, 2000)