PUBLIC DRINKING PRACTICES OF COLLEGE YOUTHS: IMPLICATIONS FOR PREVENTION PROGRAMS
This research reviews the article "Public Drinking Practices of College Youths: Implications for Prevention Programs" by David P. Kraft. The focus of this review is on the adequacy of the statistical methodology employed by the researcher and the theory providing the basis for the conduct of the study and the selection of the methodological procedures employed.
Theory Providing the Basis For the Conduct of the Study and the Selection of the Methodology
The research reported in the article was essentially a descriptive survey of the public alcohol consumption behaviors of students at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst. The research was based on data collected during the 1975 1978 period (Kraft, p. 59). At the time the research reported in the article was conducted, research findings reported in the literature indicated that (1) the prevalence of alcohol consumption among college students was high, (2) heavy drinking among college students led to acute alcohol related problems among college students, and (3) the risk among college students that one or more acute alcohol related problems associated with periodic "drunken episodes" would be experienced was far greater than was the risk of becoming a chronic alcohol abuser as a consequence of alcohol consumption behaviors while a college student (Kraft, p. 54). Based on these findings, a theory was formulated that held that the best way to reduce the incidence of alcohol related problems among college students was to reduce the incidence of Periodic drunken episodes among such students (Kraft, p. 54). This theoretical construct was extended to hold (1) that alcohol related problems are preceded by identifiable and related behaviors, and (2) that these antecedent behaviors are the outcomes of a combination of "predisposing, enabling, and reinforcing factors" (Kraft, p. 58).
Within the ...