Effectiveness of a Combined Web-Based and Ecological Momentary Intervention for Incoming First Year University Students

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Young adults have the highest alcohol consumption of any age group. Within this high risk age group, university students stand out, consuming more alcohol than their non-university attending peers. As a result, university students not only have a higher incidence of alcohol use disorders, but also report a higher incidence of harm resulting from alcohol. A number of factors have been implicated in this increase in alcohol use at university, however, new research suggests that drinking during certain events (e.g., Orientation Week) may have a flow on effect and influence the number of drinks students consume throughout the year. The primary aim of the research project is to reduce overall alcohol consumption by university students (i.e., alcohol consumed during the academic year) by using a combination of web-based intervention (WBI) and EMI. We hypothesize that a brief WBI and EMI will reduce the amount of alcohol use throughout both Orientation Week and throughout the year (relative to a control group or a WBI only condition). Participants will be randomly assigned at baseline to either a control condition, WBI only condition, or a WBI + EMI condition. The WBI only and the WBI + EMI condition will receive the WBI at baseline. The WBI will combine aspects of social norms, provide information on Alcohol Use Disorder Identification Test (AUDIT) score, Blood Alcohol Content, risk of alcohol-related consequences, long-term consequences, and protective behavioural strategies. The intervention will be automatically generated by the system and delivered after participants' initial survey and include sections of text with feedback about their drinking. The online intervention will take approximately 5-10 minutes to complete and is to be completed by participants prior to Orientation Week. The WBI and EMI condition will also be sent intervention text messages twice a day (at 1pm and 7pm) on the Tuesday, Thursday, Friday, and Saturday of Orientation Week. The 1pm messages will remind participants of a protective behavioural strategy presented in the online intervention. The 7pm messages will contain a social consequence of alcohol use. These participants will also receive fortnightly EMI messages during the first semester. These messages will be sent on a Wednesday reminding participants of the drinking norms (tailored to gender). All conditions will be asked to respond to 2 Orientation Week messages and 14 fortnightly text messages during the academic year asking them to report their drinking from the past 3 days (e.g., 'How many standard drinks did you consume Thurs, Fri, Sat? Please Text Back (TB) like this 5, 0, 1). All participants will also fill out a questionnaire at the start and end of the semester (baseline, 3 months, 9 months, 15 months, and 21 months) asking them to report their drinking and alcohol-related consequences.