SOCIAL NORMS CAMPAIGN PRE-TEST AND POST-TEST RESULTS

Background
The Office of Wellbeing ran a pre-test to measure incoming first year Wake students perceptions and behaviors centered
on alcohol use and their social settings.
Methodology
A pre-test was administered at the beginning of the semester at the freshman orientation by paper. After the pre-test was
administered, first year students were separated into a test group (Group 1) and a control group (Group 2) based on where
their on-campus housing was located. The social norms campaign then ran for a period of 5 weeks and was administered
to Group 1 in the form of posters hung up in their common areas and bathrooms. After the 5 weeks of the posters were
complete the post-test was administered again among all of the students.
After running statistical test on the survey data comparing the means for each question, Group 1 and Group 2 showed no
statistically significant difference at the pre-test phase. This means that all students in each group started at the same level
at baseline. Because they all show to be the same at baseline, we are able to compare the differences in the means between
the pre-survey and post-survey among the two different groups.
The students were asked a series of questions that included their perceptions about alcohol use among college students
and questions about their behaviors.
Results
Perceptions of Alcohol Use among College Students:
Figure 1: In your opinion, what percentage of college students do NOT use alcohol as a part of their socialization?

In the above question, between pre-test and post-test, there was an increase in how many students all of the test
participants thought drank as a part of their socialization. We can see this by the decrease of percentage in both Group 1
and Group 2. Although they both decreased in percentages, Group 1 had a smaller decrease at .34%, whereas Group 2 had
a decrease of .65%.

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Figure 2: In your opinion, what percentage of students help others in alcohol emergencies, such as alcohol poisoning,
serious medical problem, accident, or injury?

According to the post data we had an increase in the mean of the percentage of students who would help each other in
alcohol emergencies among both groups but the greatest increase was among Group 1 at an 11.16% increase, whereas
Group 2 has an increase of 9.42%.
Figure 3: In your opinion, what percentage of students tell a friend when he or she has had too much to drink?

According to the post data there was an increase in the percentage of students who would tell their friends they had too
much to drink, but it shows that Group 1 had a smaller increase of 7.78%, than Group 2 who had an increase of 8.97%.

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Figure 4: In your opinion, among students who drink what percentage of students typically drink 5 or more drinks on
any occasion?

This survey question about belief of the percentage of college students who typically drink 5 or more drinks is about
determining students perceptions about binge drinking. Based on the post-test data, there was an increase in the amount
of students that survey participants believe binge drank; Group 1 had a smaller increase of 3.69%, while Group 2 had a
4.40% increase.
Figure 5: In your opinion, among students who drink, what percentage of students drink to the point that they have
trouble remembering?

According to the post data, there shows a decrease in the percentage of those who drink to the point of not remembering
among Group 1 at a .66% decrease, whereas there is a 1.14% increase among Group 2.

Students Reported Behaviors:

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Yes/No Questions: Responses were calculated by the percentage of yes responses within each group.
Figure 1: Have you used alcohol in the last 30 days? Yes

According to the post-data, there was an overall decrease among both Group 1 and Group 2 regarding their alcohol use in
the past 30 days. Group 1 had a greater decrease of alcohol use at 6.70%, while Group 2 had a 2.00% decrease of alcohol
use.
Figure 2: In the past month, as a result of drinking alcohol, have you had trouble remembering? Yes

According to the post-test data, students in Group 1 had a decrease of 3.10% of people who had trouble remembering as a
result of alcohol use. In contrast, Group 2 had a 1.30% in the amount of people who had trouble remembering as a result
of alcohol.

Figure 3: In the past month, as a result of drinking alcohol, have you acted ways that are not typical for you? Yes
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According to the post-test fewer students in Group 1 acted in ways that were not typical of them as a result of drinking
alcohol. Group 1 had a 2.7% decrease of students who acted in ways that are not typical for them as a result of alcohol
use, while Group 2 had an increase in the amount of students by 5.1%. When doing a Chi-square statistical test to compare
the groups at post-test, it resulted in a p-value of .034, which shows that there is a statistically significant difference
between Group 1 and Group 2 at post-test.
Likert Scale Survey Questions: (1) Never, (2) Rarely, (3) Sometimes, (4) Frequently, (5) Always, (6) I do not
drink/ Not Applicable

Figure 1 and 2 do not encompass choice #6

Figure 6 was an open ended question

Figure 1: How likely are you to take action to assist in an alcohol emergency, such as alcohol poisoning, serious
medical problem, accident, or injury?

According to the post-test both Group 1 and Group 2 averaged Frequently to Always in the amount of times they will
assist someone in an alcohol emergency. Group 1 had a slightly greater increase at .1.
Figure 2: How likely are you to tell a friend when he or she has consumed too much alcohol?

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According to the post-test Group 1 had a small increase in the amount of times they would tell a friend he or she has had
consumed too much alcohol at a .09 increase. Group 2 showed to have a decrease in the amount of times that they would
tell a friend he or she had consumed too much alcohol at a .04 decrease.
Figure 3: How often do you determine how you will get home before you start drinking?

According to the post-test, both groups had an increase in the frequency of how often they determine how they will get
home before they start drinking. While they both had an increase, Group 1 showed a greater increase 3.8 whereas Group 2
showed an increase of 3.53. When performing an independent samples t-test for this question, there is a p-value of .017,
which shows that there is a statistically significant difference between Group 1 and Group 2.

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Figure 4: How often do you eat before and while you are drinking?

According to the post-test, both groups had an increase on the frequency of whether they eat before and while they are
drinking. While they both increased, Group 1 showed a greater increase with a .42 increase whereas Group 2 only showed
a .27 increase.
Figure 5: How often do you keep track of how many drinks you consume?

According to the post-test, both groups had an increase in the amount of time they keep track of how many drinks they
consume. While they both increased, Group 1 had a greater increase of .45, whereas Group 2 only showed an increase of .
21.

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Figure 6: In the past month, what is the maximum number of drinks you had on any one occasion?

According to the post-test, both groups decreased their maximum amount of drinks on any one occasion. Group 1 had
greater decrease of maximum drinks which is 1.30 drinks whereas Group 2 only had a .09 decrease in the maximum
amount of drinks they consumed.
Summary
The results of looking at the data revealed that the social norms campaign that was ran and administered to a test group of
students was effective and showed many positive improvements.
Perceptions:
Students perceptions of whether they would help in an alcohol emergency increased for both groups, but increased at a
greater rate for Group 1, our test group. Group 1 also had a decrease in the amount of students they believed had trouble
remembering because of alcohol, whereas Group 2, our control group had an increase in the amount of students that had
trouble remembering due to alcohol use. We can hypothesize that the social norms campaign that was administered to the
test group had an effect on the positive norm shifting.
After the post-survey was administered we found that among both groups of students, they believed more college students
used alcohol as a part of their socialization. While this is not the way we wanted the data to trend, Group 1 had a smaller
increase than Group. We can hypothesize that even though there was an increase in the amount of college students
participants thought used alcohol as their socialization that our social norms campaign could have helped mediate this
increase and caused it to be smaller.
While it is positive that both groups had an increase in the percentage for their perception of students who would tell their
friend when he or she had too much to drink, we wanted to see the test group (Group 1) have a greater increase, yet Group
2 had the greater increase. There are many possibilities that could have caused Group 1 to have a smaller increase such as:
their personal experiences with alcohol, their peers experiences with alcohol use, the wording of the social norms data on
the poster and the students ability to understand what the information was communicating, or the possibility that students
in Group 1 did not see the poster as much as needed to help shift their normative perceptions of how many people tell
their friends they have had too much to drink.
While the goal was to get students to believe that there were less students who binge drink than they thought, There are
any many reasons that there could have been an increase among Group 1: their personal experiences with alcohol, their
peers experiences with alcohol use, the wording of the social norms data on the poster and the students ability to
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understand what the information was communicating, or the possibility that students in Group 1 did not see the poster as
much as needed to help shift their normative perceptions of binge drinking.
Reported Behaviors:
While the decrease in drinking is a step in the right direction for all students, the literature shows that students drinking
increases their first semester in college. In our case, we can possibly attribute the decrease in drinking to a few factors:
post-test sample size, effective prevention education at first year students orientation at the beginning of the year or
effective normative messages throughout the 5 week campaign.
We can also say that the social norms campaign possibly had an effect on the decrease in the amount of those who had
trouble remembering as a result of alcohol use in Group 1 as well as the decrease in students in Group 1 who acted in
ways that were not typical of them. We found a statistically significant difference between Group 1 and Group 2after
running the Chi-Square statistical analysis on the question, As a result of drinking alcohol, have you acted in ways that
were not typical for you, with a p-value of .034.
In all of the Likert scale questions, we found that Group 1 tested in a direction of positive behavior shift and we can say
that the social norms campaign that was administered to them had a positive effect on this behavior shift. When running
independent samples t-test, we also found that the question, How often do you determine how you will get home before
you start drinking, had a statistically significant difference in Group 1 and Group 2 with a p-value of .017.

Table of all survey questions Pre-test and Post-Test

Perception Questions:

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Behavior Questions:

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