Normative Misperceptions Research Articles

Legal analysis of different approaches to understanding the phenomenon of miscarriage of justice in administrative proceedings

The article is devoted to the study of various approaches to understanding the phenomenon of a miscarriage of justice in administrative proceedings. The author establishes that a miscarriage of justice in administrative proceedings can be referred to in several senses. Firstly, a miscarriage of justice in administrative proceedings can be understood in a narrow sense, depending on the aspect specifically chosen (epistemological, praxeological and teleological) or their combination. The epistemological aspect of understanding a miscarriage of justice in administrative proceedings relates to the processes of mental and cognitive activity of a judge. Within this aspect, a miscarriage of justice is considered as a result of a defect in the subject matter of a judge’s cognitive actions, which may be manifested in incorrect processing or interpretation of information. The praxeological aspect of understanding a miscarriage of justice in administrative proceedings focuses on the compliance of the judge’s actions with the requirements and procedural rules set forth in the law. In this context, a miscarriage of justice is manifested as an unlawful act (action or inaction) of a judge, which consists in the judge’s incorrect application of substantive law or violation of procedural law. The teleological aspect of understanding a miscarriage of justice relates to the purposes of administrative proceedings. Under this approach, a miscarriage of justice is defined as a result that does not meet the goals of administrative proceedings. The interconnection and interdependence of the epistemological, praxeological and teleological aspects forms a comprehensive understanding, a holistic perception of this phenomenon in administrative proceedings. This integration of different perspectives makes it possible to characterize a miscarriage of justice by providing a deep and multilevel understanding of its nature. In a broad sense, a miscarriage of justice in administrative proceedings can be understood as a judge’s procedural activity related to the misperception, analysis or reproduction of legal norms, which is reflected in the adoption of a court decision that is unable to achieve the purpose of administrative proceedings.

Gender Differences in Normative Misperceptions of Food and Alcohol Disturbance Among a Multi-Site Sample of College Students

Background: Engagement in food and alcohol disturbance (FAD; e.g., restricting caloric intake in the context of using alcohol to quicken/increase intoxication [FAD-intoxication] and/or to offset calories consumed from alcohol [FAD-calories]) confers risk to college students. Much research suggests that students overestimate the frequency of high-risk drinking among their peers, leading to greater participation in personal high-risk drinking. However, limited work has examined social norms related to FAD and their association with FAD behaviors. Objectives: The present study investigated: (a) whether normative misperceptions exist for FAD, (b) whether FAD norms are associated with FAD behaviors, and (c) whether gender moderates the association between FAD norms and FAD behaviors. Participants were 1,499 college students from six universities who consumed alcohol in the last month and identified as a woman or man. A plurality of participants identified as being White, non-Hispanic (59.5%) and female (68.1%), with a mean age of 19.66 (SD = 2.09) years. Results: Analyses revealed that students overestimated the frequency and approval of both FAD-intoxication and FAD-calories behaviors among their same-gender peers. Notably, these misperceptions were greater for FAD participators compared to FAD abstainers. Moreover, the associations between FAD norms and FAD behaviors were generally stronger for women compared to men. Conclusions: Our preliminary findings identify social norms as a potential target for interventions aiming to reduce FAD among college students. Further, our results provide preliminary evidence that college women, especially those who engage in FAD, may reap the greatest benefit from interventions targeting normative misperceptions (e.g., personalized normative feedback) related to FAD.

The interplay of misperceptions and willingness to share opinions in full classroom networks: The case of opinions towards homosexuality

Social norms influence homophobic behavior, yet these norms are often misperceived. We study the extent to which friendship ties and group memberships are related to misperceptions of opinions towards homosexuality, and how these misperceptions are sustained in social networks through opinion sharing. We find that misperceptions lead individuals to be less willing to share their opinions with ethno-religious ingroup members, non-friends or with individuals whom they perceive to hold different opinions. Although differences observed in the context of this study are relatively small, they may add up over time. These results offer scope for interventions that try to reduce norm misperceptions between groups - as a way to stimulate social change towards a more tolerant society.

Perceived and Actual Norms, and Norm Misperceptions in Explaining Participant Roles in Bullying.

Bullying norms have been shown to affect adolescents' decisions on different behaviors in bullying situations, but little is known about the differential contribution of perceived and actual bullying norms as well as their agreement. The present study investigated the effects of perceived and actual norms, along with norm misperceptions in participant roles in bullying. A sample of 890 students (337 fourth-, 223 fifth-, and 320 sixth-graders; Female 48%; Mage = 11.98, SDage = 0.82) from 34 classrooms in South Korean elementary schools was assessed at two time points: at the beginning (Wave 1) and at the end of the semester (Wave 2). Multilevel modeling results indicated that empathy as well as perceived and actual anti-bullying norms had unique effects on different participant roles in bullying. The agreement between perceived and actual norms also varied across classes, and bullying, victimization, and bystanding were found to be higher in classes where individuals misperceived the actual anti-bullying norms. Adolescents were more likely to defend in response to their empathy in classes with higher anti-bullying norms, while they were less likely to bystand in response to their empathy in classes where individuals accurately perceived the actual anti-bullying norms. These findings underscore that intervention programs can focus on correcting adolescents' erroneous perceptions and convictions about peers' anti-bullying attitudes to alleviate bullying and its negative consequences.

Misperceived Social Norms and Willingness to Act Against Climate Change

Abstract We document the individual willingness to act against climate change and study the role of social norms in a large sample of US adults. Individual beliefs about social norms positively predict pro-climate donations, comparable in strength to universal moral values and economic preferences. However, we document systematic misperceptions of social norms. Respondents vastly underestimate the prevalence of climate-friendly behaviors and norms. Correcting these misperceptions in an experiment causally raises individual willingness to act against climate change and individual support for climate policies. The effects are strongest for individuals who are skeptical about the existence and threat of global warming.

Misperception of Norms About Intimate Partner Violence as a Driver of Personal IPV Attitudes and Perpetration: A Population-Based Study of Men in Rural Uganda.

Intimate partner violence (IPV) against women is a global public health problem. Conceptual frameworks suggest misperceived norms around IPV might drive perpetration of violence against women in southern and eastern Africa. We conducted a cross-sectional, population-based survey of all men residing in a rural parish in southwest Uganda, eliciting their endorsement of IPV in five hypothetical scenarios and their reported frequency of perpetration of violence against their wife/main partner. They also reported their perceptions about the extent to which most other men in their villages endorsed and/or perpetrated IPV, which we compared against the population data to measure the primary explanatory variable of interest: whether individuals misperceived norms around IPV. We fitted multivariable Poisson regression models specifying personal IPV endorsement and IPV perpetration as the outcomes. Overall, 765 men participated in the study (90% response rate): 182 (24%) personally endorsed IPV, and 78 of 456 partnered men (17%) reported perpetrating one or more acts of IPV at least once per month. Although most men neither endorsed nor reported perpetrating IPV, 342 (45%) men mistakenly thought that most other men in their villages endorsed IPV and 365 (48%) men mistakenly thought that most other men perpetrate IPV at least monthly. In multivariable regression models, men who misperceived most men to endorse IPV were more likely to endorse IPV themselves (adjusted relative risk [aRR] = 2.44; 95% CI [1.66, 3.59]; p < .001). Among partnered men, those who misperceived IPV perpetration to be normative were more likely to perpetrate IPV themselves (aRR = 4.38; [2.53, 7.59]; p < .001). Interventions to correct misperceived norms about IPV may be a promising method for reducing violence against women in rural Uganda.

(Mis)Perceptions of bystander behaviors and approval: The role of gender-specific perceived norms.

The current study examines college students' perceptions of same-gender and opposite gender peer norms for bystander behaviors in drinking contexts, as well as the association between perceived norms and participants' willingness to intervene and actual behavior. Participants completed an online survey assessing bystander-related perceived norms, willingness, and behavior. A subset of participants also completed a measure of bystander behavior 4-months later. The results indicated a divergent pattern of normative misperceptions for descriptive and injunctive norms, in which participants overestimated descriptive norms and underestimated injunctive norms. Further, participants who perceived greater perceived injunctive norms reported greater willingness to intervene in the future. While those who perceived that their peers intervened more frequently were more likely to have engaged in bystander behavior at baseline and the four-month follow-up. Results also suggest that the role of gender-specific norms is complex and dependent on participants' own gender. The results indicate the potential value of developing norms-based interventions addressing bystander behaviors and implications for the types of normative misperceptions to target.

Promoting Prescription Drug Safety Skills in School: Evaluating the Effectiveness of a Technology-Based Curriculum

BackgroundPrescription drug misuse among youth aged 12–18 remains high in the United States. Grounded in Social Norms Theory, school-based curricula have been shown to effectively challenge students’ misperceptions of peer norms and safety regarding prescription drug misuse (PDM).ObjectiveThe present study is a quasi-experimental evaluation of a brief, no cost, school-based prescription drug safety program.MethodsParticipants included 94 teachers and their students (n = 2325) in grades 8 through 12. Teachers (and their students) were assigned to experimental or control conditions. Using a pre-/post-survey design, we examined whether the curriculum promoted growth in five key student outcomes: Personal Responsibility, Social Norms, Knowledge, Future Actions, and Refusal Skills. Student demographic characteristics and prescription drug history were examined as moderators of growth. Within the experimental group, variation in implementation factors such as teachers’ prior experience with the program and perceptions of student engagement were examined as moderators of the effectiveness of the curriculum.ResultsMultilevel models demonstrated equitable growth in Personal Responsibility, Social Norms, Knowledge, Future Actions, and Refusal Skills across gender, race, and other demographic characteristics. Students’ prescription drug history was not associated with growth on the five key outcomes. Growth in Personal Responsibility, Social Norms, Knowledge, and Future Actions was maintained in a one-month follow-up survey. Teacher perceptions of student engagement were associated with lower growth in Social Norms.ConclusionsThe findings suggest promising implications for the scalability of an effective, brief, no cost, technology-based intervention targeting adolescent PDM.

Normative Misperceptions About Cannabis Use in a Sample of Risky Cannabis Users.

This study examines normative misperceptions in a sample of participants recruited for a brief intervention trial targeting risky cannabis use. Participants who were concerned about their own risky cannabis use were recruited to help develop and evaluate intervention materials. At baseline, participants reported on their own cannabis use and provided estimates of how often others their gender and age used cannabis in the past 3 months. Comparisons were made between participants estimates of others cannabis use with reports of cannabis use obtained from a general population survey conducted during a similar time period. Participants (N = 744, mean age = 35.8, 56.2% identified as female) largely reported daily or almost daily cannabis use (82.4%). Roughly half (55.3%) of participants estimated that others their age and gender used cannabis weekly or more often in the past 3 months, whereas the majority of people in the general population reported not using cannabis at all. Normative misperceptions about cannabis use were common in this sample of people with risky cannabis use. Limitations and possible future directions of this research are discussed, as well as the potential for targeting these misperceptions in interventions designed to motivate reductions in cannabis use. NCT04060602.

Does Belief in Conspiracy Theories Affect Interpersonal Relationships?

In recent years, researchers have begun to study the social consequences of conspiracy beliefs. However, little research has investigated the impact of conspiracy beliefs on interpersonal relationships. In this review, we draw attention to this issue by summarizing available empirical evidence and proposing potential social-psychological mechanisms to explain whether and why conspiracy theories affect interpersonal relationships. We firstly discuss that the attitude change that often accompanies the internalization of conspiracy beliefs might distance people's opinions and, consequently, erode their relationships. Furthermore, we argue that the stigmatizing value of conspiracy theories can negatively affect the evaluation of conspiracy believers and discourage others from getting close to them. Finally, we consider that the misperception of social norms associated with the acceptance of certain conspiracy narratives can lead conspiracy believers to engage in non-normative behavior. Others are likely to perceive such behavior negatively, resulting in diminished interpersonal interaction. We highlight the need for further research to address these issues, as well as the potential factors that may prevent relationships being eroded by conspiracy beliefs.

The Effects of Sexual Violence Victimization on Perceived Peer Norms and Social Barriers to Bystander Intervention Among High School Students.

The experience of sexual victimization may lead to increased threat-biased information processing, including increased perceptions of peer attitudes that condone sexual violence. The perception that peers generally condone sexual violence may in turn inhibit survivors of sexual violence from intervening to address risk for harm among their peers. To assess this possibility, the present study examined the direct and indirect association between sexual victimization by a romantic partner, perceived peer rape myth acceptance (RMA), perceived social barriers to bystander intervention, and bystander behaviors over 2-month follow-up in a sample of 843 high school students. Multiple regression path analyses revealed a sequence of positive associations between sexual victimization, perceived peer RMA, and perceived social barriers to bystander intervention, respectively. These direct associations to be significant among girls, but not boys, and revealed an additional negative direct association between perceived social barriers to bystander intervention and bystander behavior over 2-month follow-up among girls. Furthermore, sexual victimization was indirectly associated with decreased bystander behaviors among girls through perceived peer RMA and perceived social barriers to bystander intervention, respectively. Taken together, the current findings highlight the importance of addressing misperceptions of peer norms among survivors of sexual violence in bystander intervention programs.

Normative misperceptions regarding pro-environmental behavior: Mediating roles of outcome efficacy and problem awareness

The mismatch between individually perceived norms and actual collective norms, termed normative misperceptions, is prevalent and predictive of behaviors. Through a survey conducted across six provinces in China (N = 952), we proposed and tested two types of normative misperceptions in the environmental domain, namely descriptive and injunctive misperceptions. We found evidence indicating the presence of both underestimated misperceptions, which were associated with participants’ reduced pro-environmental engagement. Quantile regressions revealed differences in the above effects across individuals; specifically, descriptive misperception exerted a stronger impact on those participants less engaged in pro-environmental behavior, but this effect did not emerge for injunctive misperception. We identified two psychological factors behind the relationship between misperceptions and pro-environmental behavior: outcome efficacy explained the effects of descriptive misperception on pro-environmental behavior while problem awareness accounted for the effects of injunctive misperception on pro-environmental behavior. The theoretical and practical implications of these findings are discussed.

Designing the market for job vacancies: A trust experiment with employment centers staff

We use a trust experiment to study the behavior of 500 employment agents who serve as matchmakers between labor supply and demand. These agents often face difficult trade-offs when they do not find a suitable match within their employment center: they can either place a suboptimal job seeker, let a vacancy go unfilled, or collaborate with other competing employment centers by sharing vacancies and job seekers at the risk of losing business to their competitors. We show in our experiment that lack of trust and norm misperceptions impede such collaboration. In addition, we observe that financial incentives increase collaboration but also employer poaching, and that social incentives in the form of a reputation mechanism decrease poaching. Finally, we find that the agents’ level of norm misperceptions and their willingness to cooperate influence the effectiveness of these incentives. We discuss policy implications and suggest research avenues to study the overlooked role of intermediaries in market design, and in particular in the market of agencies offering employment services.

High School Students' Perceptions of School Personnel's Intentions to Help Prevent Teen Sexual and Dating Violence: Associations with Attitudes and Intended Behaviors.

Adolescents are at high risk for sexual and dating violence (SDV) at school, indicating need for both adolescents and school personnel to engage in bystander behavior to prevent SDV. Adolescents' perceptions of social norms about bystander behavior, including their perceptions about social norms among school personnel, may impact adolescents' own SDV attitudes and intended bystander behavior. Based on social norms theory, the current research examines adolescents who underestimate, accurately perceive, and overestimate school personnel's reactive (responding to a current situation) and proactive (spreading messaging about prevention) bystander behaviors. High school students (N = 3,404; mean age = 15.7; 87.2% White; 87% heterosexual) and school personnel (N = 1,150) from 25 schools completed surveys. Adolescents who underestimated school personnel's reactive and proactive bystander behavior had more accepting attitudes towards violence and less bystander behavior intentions. Correcting misperceived norms about bystander behavior may improve students' own bystander behavior.

An in-school social norms approach intervention for reducing unhealthy snacking behaviours amongst 11-12-year-olds.

Adolescents tend to overestimate the extent of peers' unhealthy snacking consumption and such misperceptions have been associated with increased personal unhealthy snacking. This study aims to test whether a Social Norms Approach (SNA) intervention which challenges these misperceptions of peers' unhealthy snacking will have a positive effect on students' personal unhealthy snacking behaviours, related attitudes, and behavioural intentions. A quasi-experimental study tested the effectiveness of an in-school SNA intervention (n = 163) compared to a control condition (n = 95) among 11-12-year-old students. Both conditions received healthy eating information, while students in the SNA intervention received additional normative feedback (outlining the discrepancies between perceived and actual unhealthy snacking of the majority based on baseline data) delivered through an interactive poster-making session. Students completed self-reported measures of personal unhealthy snacking, related-attitudes, behavioural intentions, and normative perceptions (descriptive and injunctive) at baseline, post-intervention, and at a 3-month follow-up. Students who received SNA feedback were significantly less likely to overestimate peers' unhealthy snacking attitudes post-intervention (F(1,232) = 16.405, p < .001), and at 3-month follow-up consumed fewer unhealthy snacks (F(1,232) = 6.133, p = .014) and had less positive attitudes towards unhealthy snacking (F(1,198) = 8.779, p = .003). The changes in personal snacking attitudes at 3-month follow-up were mediated by changes in normative misperceptions about peers' unhealthy snacking attitudes post-intervention, which indicated that the reductions in normative misperceptions following SNA messages mediated the effect of the intervention. The results indicate that in-school SNA interventions which challenge normative misperceptions constitute a promising strategy for reducing unhealthy snacking in young adolescents.

The role of perceived social norms in college student vaccine hesitancy: Implications for COVID-19 prevention strategies

Among US adults, the highest rates of hesitancy to receive the COVID-19 vaccine are among young adults aged 18 to 25. Vaccine hesitancy is particularly concerning among young adults in college, where social interactions on densely populated campuses can lead to substantial community spread. Given that many colleges have opted not to mandate vaccines, identification of modifiable predictors of vaccine hesitancy – such as perceived social norms – is key to informing interventions to promote vaccine uptake. To address this need, we examined predictors of and explicit reasons for vaccine hesitancy among 989 students aged 18 to 25 recruited from four geographically diverse US universities in the spring of 2021. At the time of the survey, 57.3% had been vaccinated, 13.7% intended to be vaccinated as soon as possible, and 29.0% were vaccine hesitant. Common reasons for hesitancy were wanting to see how it affected others first (75.2%), not believing it was necessary (30.0%), and other reasons (17.4%), which were examined via content analysis and revealed prominent safety concerns. Despite these varied explicit reasons, logistic regressions revealed that, when controlling for demographics and pandemic-related experiences, perceived descriptive and injunctive social norms for vaccine uptake were each significant predictors of vaccine hesitancy (ORs = 0.35 and 0.78, respectively). When both norms were entered into the same model, only perceived descriptive norms uniquely predicted vaccine hesitancy (OR = 0.37; 95% CI: 0.29 – 0.46). Findings suggest perceived social norms are strongly associated with vaccine-related behavior among young adult college students. Correcting normative misperceptions may be a promising approach to increase vaccine uptake and slow the spread of COVID-19 among young adults.

A social norms approach intervention to address misperceptions of anti-vaccine conspiracy beliefs amongst UK parents.

Anti-vaccine conspiracy beliefs among parents can reduce vaccination intentions. Parents’ beliefs in anti-vaccine conspiracy theories are also related to their perceptions of other parents’ conspiracy beliefs. Further, research has shown that parents hold misperceptions of anti-vaccine conspiracy belief norms: UK parents over-estimate the anti-vaccine conspiracy beliefs of other parents. The present study tested the effectiveness of a Social Norms Approach intervention, which corrects misperceptions using normative feedback, to reduce UK parents’ anti-vaccine conspiracy beliefs and increase vaccination intentions. At baseline, 202 UK parents of young children reported their personal belief in anti-vaccine conspiracy theories, future intentions to vaccinate, and their perceptions of other UK parents’ beliefs and intentions. Participants were then randomly assigned to a normative feedback condition (n = 89) or an assessment-only control condition (n = 113). The normative feedback compared participants’ personal anti-vaccine conspiracy beliefs and perceptions of other UK parents’ beliefs with actual normative belief levels. Parents receiving the normative feedback showed significantly reduced personal belief in anti-vaccine conspiracy beliefs at immediate post-test. As hypothesised, changes in normative perceptions of anti-vaccine conspiracy beliefs mediated the effect of the intervention. The intervention, did not directly increase vaccination intentions, however mediation analysis showed that the normative feedback increased perceptions of other parents’ vaccination intentions, which in turn increased personal vaccination intentions. No significant effects remained after a six-week follow-up. The current research demonstrates the potential utility of Social Norms Approach interventions for correcting misperceptions and reducing anti-vaccine conspiracy beliefs among UK parents. Further research could explore utilising a top-up intervention to maintain the efficacy.

Going against the Norm: A Mixed Methods Analysis of College Students’ Arguments against the College Drinking Culture

Objective College alcohol beliefs (e.g. “College is a time for experimentation with alcohol”) are highly predictive of heavy drinking and its consequences. Yet, current college alcohol interventions do not address this belief system even though researchers have recommended that these beliefs be targeted. Method Using a mixed methods approach, we conducted two studies to generate arguments against the college drinking culture and to evaluate the effectiveness of such arguments. Results In Study 1, freshman students (N = 104, 65% women) wrote an essay to a fictitious roommate presenting arguments against the college drinking culture. Responses were reliably coded into a 19-category scheme. The most common arguments included that (1) one’s focus should be on academics, (2) drinking will lead to academic consequences, and (3) drinking is not a rite of passage in college. In Study 2, college students (N = 488) rated the effectiveness of prototype arguments drawn from each Study 1 category. According to their ratings, the most effective arguments were that (1) one’s focus should be on academics, (2) drinking could have a negative impact on one’s career, and (3) one could do potential harm to others. Conclusions The student-generated arguments against the college drinking culture identified in his research have inherent ecological validity and will help inform the development of new interventions to counter such beliefs. We offer suggestions for translating our findings into clinical interventions. The problem of college student drinking has been long-standing (Kilmer et al., 2014) and remains a significant public health issue today (Hingson et al., 2017). Decades of research on college student drinking and its consequences have identified key cognitive factors that underlie drinking and its consequences, such as the misperception of norms for drinking (Borsari & Carey, 2003) and the positive expectancies students hold about the effects of drinking (Jones et al., 2001; Monk & Heim, 2013). The robust relationships between these cognitive variables and alcohol consumption among college students have led to the development of interventions that target these variables. Social norms marketing campaigns (DeJong et al., 2006), personalized normative feedback (Lewis & Neighbors, 2006), and expectancy challenge techniques (Scott-Sheldon et al., 2012) have been a part of interventions designed to correct students’ misperceptions about the percentage of and amount students drink and the effects that alcohol has on their functioning in social situations. Reviews of the literature have demonstrated that interventions containing these components are effective for first year students (Scott-Sheldon et al., 2014) and mandated students (Carey et al., 2016), except for interventions targeting student members of Greek letter organizations (Scott-Sheldon et al., 2016). Effect sizes in most interventions across freshman and mandated students tend to be modest and not very durable in the long-term (Carey et al., 2016; Scott-Sheldon et al., 2014). However, recent research reveals that a variety of new intervention strategies may be useful in addressing the problem of college student drinking (Dunn et al., 2020; Kazemi et al., 2020; King et al., 2020; Magill et al., 2017; Pedrelli et al., 2020; Young & Neighbors, 2019). Aside from social norms and positive alcohol expectancies, another cognitive variable has been found to be a very robust predictor, mediator, and moderator of college student drinking and its consequences – college alcohol beliefs (Crawford & Novak, 2006; Osberg et al., 2010).

Overestimation of alcohol consumption norms as a driver of alcohol consumption: a whole-population network study of men across eight villages in rural, southwestern Uganda.

Little is known about how perceived norms about alcohol consumption may influence high alcohol consumption rates in Uganda. This study estimated the accuracy of perceived norms about men's alcohol consumption and estimated the association between perceived norms and personal alcohol consumption. Cross-sectional, whole-population, sociocentric social network study. Eight rural villages in Rwampara District, southwestern Uganda in 2016-18. A total of 719 men aged 18years and older (representing 91% of permanent resident men). Self-reported frequent (≥4days per week) and heavy alcohol consumption (six or more drinks on one occasion, more than three occasions of intoxication, or spending an excessive amount on alcohol). Participants also reported whether they thought most other men in their village engaged in frequent and heavy alcohol consumption (perceived norms). Using the network study design, we calculated alcohol consumption behavior within villages and social networks. Perceived norms were compared with aggregated self-reports. Multivariable Poisson regression models were used to estimate the association between perceived norms and individual behavior. Throughout villages, frequent and heavy alcohol consumption ranged from 7 to 37%. However, 527 (74%) participants perceived, contrary to fact, that most other men in their villages frequently consumed alcohol, and 576 (81%) perceived that most others heavily consumed alcohol. Overestimation of alcohol consumption by others was pervasive among socio-demographic subgroups and was present irrespective of the actual consumption behavior at the village level and within social networks. Men who misperceived these alcohol consumption behaviors as being common were more likely to engage in frequent [adjusted relative risk (aRR)=3.98; 95% confidence interval (CI)=1.69-9.34) and heavy (aRR=4.75; 95% CI=2.33-9.69) alcohol consumption themselves. Most men in eight rural Ugandan villages incorrectly thought that frequent and heavy alcohol consumption were common among men in their villages. These misperceived norms had a strong positive association with individual drinking behavior.

Normative misperceptions of unhealthy snacking amongst 11- to 12-year-old secondary school students

Younger adolescents are at an age where they have increasing control of their diet, and where peers become an important social reference for acceptable and normative dietary behaviours. These normative perceptions are often inaccurate and can lead to the development of unhealthy eating practices; although, the role of normative misperceptions of peers' unhealthy snacking behaviours in younger adolescents' personal snacking behaviours is not clear. The current study was a cross-sectional analysis of baseline data from a social norms-based healthy eating intervention sampling two secondary schools in deprived areas of England. Students aged 11–12 years (n = 252) completed self-report measures of their demographic characteristics and personal behaviours, attitudes, intentions, and normative perceptions (descriptive and injunctive norms), relating to unhealthy snacking. Results indicated students overestimated peers' daily unhealthy snacks consumption by approximately 3.2 portions, misperceived peers to have more positive attitudes towards unhealthy snacking and more negative attitudes towards reducing snacking. The greater these misperceptions of peers' behaviours and attitudes, the more likely students were to consume unhealthy snacks and have positive attitudes about unhealthy snacking. Girls had a stronger intention to reduce their snacking behaviours if they had more positive attitudes to reducing snacking behaviours and misperceived peers to also have a positive attitude. In summary, 11- to 12-year-olds misperceive the snacking behaviour and attitudes of their peers, and such normative misperceptions are associated with students’ own snacking behaviours and attitudes. Interventions which challenge these misperceptions may assist in reducing the social acceptability of unhealthy snacking and in reducing unhealthy snacking amongst young adolescents.