Do normative perceptions of drinking relate to alcohol use in U.S. Military veterans presenting to primary care?

Objective: The current cross sectional study sought to examine whether perceived social normative beliefs are associated with indicators of alcohol use in a sample of alcohol misusing veterans.

Method: A sample of 107 U.S. Military Veterans presenting to primary care that screened positive for alcohol misuse on the alcohol use disorders identification test-consumption items (AUDIT-C) was recruited. Assessment measures were used to examine social normative beliefs and alcohol-related concerns as they relate to indicators of alcohol use at baseline.

Results: Our findings indicate mixed support for our two hypotheses in that perceived descriptive norms were associated with alcohol use indicators in the predicted direction; however, this was not the case for alcohol-related concerns. For perceived norms, we found that higher quantity beliefs were significantly related to greater alcohol consumption on a drinking day (p<.01), increased likelihood of dependence (p<.01), and frequency beliefs were significantly related to total number of drinking days (p<.01). Findings for alcohol-related concerns emerged contrary to our hypothesis, with results depicting increased alcohol-related concerns associated with higher alcohol consumption across indicators of use (ps<.01).

Summary: Findings of the current study suggest that social normative beliefs, specifically misperceptions about descriptive norms, are significantly associated with alcohol consumption in a sample of alcohol misusing veterans presenting to primary care.