Binge Drinking and University Students

Within the context of these models there appears to be significant overlap between attitudes towards alcohol and alcohol expectancies as both are thought to be shaped through vicarious and direct experiences with alcohol and both encourage drinking behaviour (Wall et al., 1998), not to mention fierce debate as to which one; the Theory of Planned Behaviour or alcohol expectancies better explain and predict binge drinking in university students. The Theory of Planned Behaviour appears to merely act as a useful framework of understanding excessive alcohol consumption while findings by Wall et al. (1998) found that alcohol expectancies enhanced the predictive power of the model. Decision making guided by attitudes is an effortful and conscious process, where as, upon exposure to alcohol-related cues, outcome expectancies are automatically activated (Wall et al., 1998). This may be a leading reason why gender-specific alcohol outcome expectancies, unlike attitudes, are proximal predictors of excessive alcohol consumption among undergraduates (Wall et al., 1998).
It is no surprise that the youth are drinking as much as they are of late, we live in an environment saturated by alcohol advertising on television, on billboards, at sporting and music events, and in national and local newspapers.…