College Drinking: Reframing a Social Problem / Changing the Culture

Drinking is recognised as one of the most important problems confronting students on campus today, with major impacts on health and safety.

This book answers crucial questions about why students drink, examines its complex links to campus crime and sexual assault, and offers new insights on how to address the issue.

It differs from other studies of college drinking by dispelling the myth that the problem is universal. Dowdall’s research reveals that the incidence of alcohol abuse varies enormously between colleges, and in doing so identifies interventions and policies that have been effective, and those that have failed. His study is also unique in looking upstream at the broader cultural, organisational and social forces that shape this behaviour, where most studies focus only on downstream behaviours, well after students have selected their college and have started drinking.

Students and parents can take action to lower the risk of binge drinking by following the book’s recommendations, and consulting the data it provides about alcohol violations and crime at thousands of colleges. For administrators and student affairs personnel, it both defines and illuminates the issue, and outlines effective interventions.