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Binge drinking within the settings of American universities and their subsequent cultures represents a public health crisis with consequences spanning all areas of health and academic performance. Previous research has found links between binge drinking and certain behavioral traits, the two most important being impulsivity and sensation-seeking (defined as “a desire to chase novel and thrilling experiences”). The combination of these two traits and their manifestation in activities like binge drinking represents the “dual systems model of adolescent risk-taking” which aids in explaining the increased prevalence of risky behavior in adolescents and younger adults. This paper aims to determine specifically how engagement in unstructured social activities (e.g. going out to bars with friends, house parties, etc.) may mediate the relationship between the traits of the dual systems model (separately, or in combination) and binge drinking.
The study’s sample consisted of 248 students from a large Midwestern university who took a comprehensive survey for additional course credit (n=248, 68.7% female, 76.4% Caucasian). This survey consisted of questions related to demographics, measures of impulsivity (via Youth Psychopathic Traits Inventory), measures of sensation-seeking (via Youth Psychopathic Traits Inventory), number of binge drinking episodes per week, and relative frequency of engagement in unstructured social activities. This data was compiled ordinally, with subsequent ordinal logistic regression used to identify relationships between the variables investigated. Numerous control variables present in the survey were used to mitigate bias, including gender, race, socioeconomic status, adverse childhood experiences, depression inventory scores, and deviant peer association.
The results of the study found, counterintuitively, a positive relationship between low sensation-seeking and binge drinking frequency (Adjusted odds ratio = .090, 95 % confidence interval = .021–.383). However, a positive relationship also exists when high sensation seeking is present with higher engagement frequency in unstructured activities (AOR = 2.791, 95 % CI =
1.270–6.131). According to the authors, this finding supports the notion that unstructured social activities cause an “exacerbation” of high sensation-seeking behavior, explaining the significantly elevated frequency of binge drinking. The study’s model did not find an association between impulsivity and binge drinking.
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Takeaway: First, it is important to mention the unexpected relationship found between low sensation-seeking and binge drinking. The authors discussed possible causes for this finding, explaining that individuals may drink in order to feel more pleasure than they regularly experience
(combatting anhedonia), or drink in order to feel increased desires for pleasure. Second, the linked factors of high sensation-seeking and unstructured activities as it relates to increased binge drinking may drive university programs to create more socially structured activities within and around campuses in order to attenuate the prevalence of binge drinking.