Alcohol and Other Drug Use

In 1994 the University of Arizona (UA) Campus Health Service (CHS) received funds from The Center for Substance Abuse Prevention (CSAP) High Risk Youth Demonstration program to, in collaboration with key senior administrators, faculty, community partners and student leaders, implement and test strategies to prevent heavy and high risk drinking among undergraduates at the UA. This CHS led effort utilized a combination of strategies: 1) social norms marketing to correct the misperceptions of students and others about attitudes, beliefs and behavioral campus norms surrounding alcohol and other drug use, and 2) environmental management to reduce availability and accessibility of alcohol, especially to underage students. By 1998 rates for heavy drinking and problems related to heavy drinking began to fall.

• Heavy drinking decreased by 29%
• Negative consequences - driving after drinking, getting in trouble with police and school authorities, getting into a fight or argument, doing something I later regretted - all decreased significantly,
• Related school problems decreased - missing class and doing poorly on a test as a result of drinking - also showed significant decreases.

In addition more stringent and uniform enforcement of alcohol-related policies (i.e. increased restrictions on alcohol availability, monitoring of alcohol distribution and consumption) significantly reduced alcohol-related incidents at Homecoming, traditionally a heavy and high-risk drinking event at the UA.

In 2003, in addition to social norms, and environmental management strategies, UA began its first pilot program for some in our highest-risk target population utilizing a motivational interviewing/cognitive skills training approach (BASICS), as a third strategy. To date CHS has received twelve federal grants to continue to mobilize campus AOD and related violence prevention efforts. Most recently, in 2005, and based in part on the early success of these approaches CHS was awarded a 1.5 million dollar grant by the Center for Substance Abuse Treatment and a $300,00 grant from the Department of Education’s Safe and Drug Free Schools program to continue to research and apply these effective strategies.