Saturday, March 15, 2025
3/15/2025
Project Summary Sexual violence (SV) and alcohol use are pervasive co-occurring epidemics on U.S. college campuses. About 25% of college women are sexually assaulted during college, and up to 55% of college students engage in heavy episodic drinking (HED; 5 or more drinks for men, 4 or more drinks for women). It is well-established that alcohol use increases the risk of SV but, more recently, findings show that alcohol also inhibits bystander intervention. However, existing bystander behavior interventions do not incorporate messages or teach skills encouraging alcohol-involved bystander intervention (e.g., bystander intervention when individuals consume alcohol or are in alcohol contexts such as bars or parties), nor tested messages among college students who engage in HED. This study aims to fill these gaps in knowledge by developing theory-driven digital media messages delivered in a social media intervention that aim to increase alcohol-involved bystander intervention. Approximately 84% of college-aged adults use social media. Social media has been used to deliver digital media messages to change behavior and attitudes in various public health areas and is an ideal way to encourage behavior within an ecological context where health behavior and decisions occur. The specific aims of this proposal are to 1) develop and produce digital media messages (i.e., pictures, images, text-only content, videos) focused on alcohol-involved bystander intervention and 2) assess the feasibility, acceptability, and preliminary efficacy of the digital media messages on alcohol-involved bystander intervention and attitudes. We will conduct focus groups to inform the development of digital media messages (n=36) and assess attention to static messages using eye-tracking technology (n=30) with college students who engage in HED. The digital media messages will raise awareness of when and how to intervene in alcohol contexts and/or when bystanders are drinking. Messages will promote identifying SV risk situations in settings involving alcohol and how to intervene safely and effectively when intoxicated or drinking (e.g., encouraging bystanders who are drinking to "scan the room," "create a diversion," "use that liquid courage to step in," etc.). We will test the developed messages in a pilot study with 60 college students who engage in HED who will be randomized to the following groups: 1) alcohol-involved bystander digital media messages or 2) attention-matched placebo digital media messages. Participants will view and engage with digital media messages in a six-week social media intervention implemented via Instagram. Feasibility will be assessed via social media metrics (e.g., shares, comments, likes), number of Instagram post views, and recruitment and retention of the sample. Acceptability of digital media messages will be assessed through an eye-tracking task and a self-report survey at immediate post-test; preliminary efficacy will be assessed via self-reported surveys at baseline, immediate post-test, and 3-month follow-up. Findings from this innovative R21 will make a critical contribution to campus SV prevention by informing a scalable social media intervention targeting alcohol-involved bystander intervention.
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