University of Florida issued the following announcement on Dec. 15
Smartphone apps to track blood alcohol abound, but until now had little evidence to show they help manage drinking in young adults. A new University of Florida study shows that heavy drinkers age 21-25 who weren’t trying to cut back on alcohol reduced their drinking by four and a half drinks per week while using the apps — nearly one drink less on each day they imbibed.
“This shows that college-age drinkers are open to ways to reduce their drinking,” said the study’s lead author, Robert Leeman, Ph.D., a professor in the University of Florida College of Health and Human Performance. “It just has to be something that fits their world, that’s easy to use and that they can do discreetly.”
Heavy drinking in this age group is common, with 23% meeting the criteria for alcohol use disorder compared to 14% of older adults. But despite potential impacts on their health and safety, those in their early 20s may feel little motivation to change their habits, making them difficult to reach with interventions, Leeman said.
“Their life is set up to facilitate drinking in a lot of ways, but that doesn't mean that they won't reduce their drinking,” he said.
In the study, published in the journal Psychology of Addictive Behaviors, participants tested three smartphone-based interventions: a Bluetooth breathalyzer paired with an app to measure blood alcohol, an app that estimates blood alcohol based on input from the user, or, in the control condition, sent a text to themselves each time they had a drink. Each had previously self-reported four or more heavy drinking days per month (four or more drinks for women, five or more for men), with at least one day with an estimated BAC of .1 % or higher and drinking at least 10 of the past 30 days.
The researchers, which included UF psychiatry professor Sara Jo Nixon and colleagues from Yale School of Medicine, Brown University, University of Washington, Boston University, University of Missouri and University of Alabama, first acquainted participants with the apps in a purpose-built lab tucked underneath UF’s football stadium. Launched in 2016, the EDGE (Ethanol, Drug & Gambling Experimental) Lab has all the trappings of a drinking establishment: a wooden bar with beer taps and paper coasters, liquor bottles and pint glasses lining the shelves. Only a handful of similar labs exist nationwide, Leeman says, and getting it off the ground wasn’t easy, given that Ben Hill Griffin Stadium didn’t allow alcohol sales in the stadium at the time.
Original source can be found here.
Alerts Sign-up