Social Influence Approach Research Articles

Universal school-based prevention for illicit drug use.

Universal school-based prevention for illicit drug use.

A Critical Review and Synthesis of Student-Athlete College Choice Factors: Recruiting Effectiveness in NCAA Sports

The sport and education literatures are replete with studies about what factors influence student-athletes' college choice decisions. Although numerous factors have been identified, how these criteria come to influence student-athlete decisions has not been fully addressed. Warranting attention is the recruitment process undertaken by schools, especially as it pertains to the role of recruiters (coaches). Based on the sport and management literature, we develop a conceptual model illustrating the fit between recruits and recruiters. This model introduces the reputation/information framework [1] and a social influence approach to NCAA sports recruitment, while also expanding upon previous college choice factor research. In our model, we propose that socially effective recruiters will be better able to identify relevant college choice factors, consolidate this information into recruitment influence strategies, and communicate these strategies by using influence tactics in order to improve recruit and influential agent fit perceptions. Aligned fit perceptions help improve the prospect of recruiters achieving their goals and realizing enhanced recruitment effectiveness. Theoretical and practical implications of our proposed conceptualization are discussed, as are directions for future research.

“Unplugged,” a European school‐based program for substance use prevention among adolescents: Overview of results from the EU‐Dap trial

The EU-Dap study aimed to develop and evaluate a school-based curriculum for the prevention of substance use among young people. The school curriculum, "Unplugged," is based on social influence approach and addresses social and personal skills, knowledge, and normative beliefs. It consists of 12 one-hour interactive sessions delivered by teachers. Its effectiveness was evaluated through a randomized trial involving 7,079 pupils of seven European countries. Unplugged was effective in reducing cigarette smoking, episodes of drunkenness, and the use of cannabis at short term. This association, however, was confined to boys, with age and self-esteem as possible explanations of this difference. Beneficial effects associated with the program persisted at fifteen-month follow-up for drunkenness, alcohol-related problems, and cannabis use, and were stronger among adolescents in schools of average low socioeconomic level. These results are of scientific importance and may inform the adoption of effective public health interventions at population level.

Short-Term Mediating Factors of a School-Based Intervention to Prevent Youth Substance Use in Europe

To investigate factors mediating the effects of a European school-based intervention (Unplugged) based on a social influence approach to youths' substance use. Schools in seven European countries (n = 143, including 7,079 pupils) were randomly assigned to an experimental condition (Unplugged curriculum) or a control condition (usual health education). Data were collected before (pretest) and 3 months after the end of the program (posttest). Multilevel multiple mediation models were applied to the study of effect mediation separately for tobacco, alcohol, and cannabis use. Analyses were conducted on the whole sample, and separately on baseline users and nonusers of each substance. Compared with the control group, participants in the program endorsed less positive attitudes toward drugs; positive beliefs about cigarettes, alcohol, and cannabis; and the normative perception of peers using tobacco and cannabis. They also increased in knowledge about all substances and refusal skills toward tobacco. Decreased positive attitudes toward drugs, increase in refusal skills, and reappraisal of norms about peer using tobacco and cannabis appeared to mediate the effects of the program on the use of substances. However, mediating effects were generally weak and some of them were only marginally significant. This study lends some support to the notion that school-based programs based on a social influence model may prevent juvenile substance use through the modification of attitudes, refusal skills, and normative perceptions.

Social influence approaches to encourage resource conservation: A meta-analysis

Would somebody be more willing to start recycling if they knew that their friends were all recycling? Social influence refers to the ways in which our behaviour is affected by what other people do, or by what other people think. Various insights from theories of social influence have been applied as part of interventions to encourage resource conservation, such as the use of social norms, social learning, and social comparison processes. The question arises: Is social influence as effective as is sometimes assumed? This review compares the effectiveness of different social influence approaches to encourage resource conservation via a meta-analysis and outlines what remains to be learned about the mechanisms linking social influence to behaviour change. A random-effects meta-analysis with a sample of 29 studies revealed that social influence approaches were effective when compared to a control group. They were also more effective when compared to another intervention, although in this case the effect size was small. The effectiveness was different for different social influence approaches and for different target groups. These findings raise a number of important questions, which form the basis of a research agenda for better understanding the processes through which social influence approaches encourage resource conservation.

School‐based programmes for preventing smoking

School‐based programmes for preventing smoking

Social and Interpersonal Approaches to Design for Behaviour Change

This paper reviews a diverse set of social and interpersonal infl uence approaches and techniques which could be relevant to designers seeking to infl uence behavior change for social and environmental bene fit. These include work on social proof (which already has some practical applications in household energy use reduction studies) and dramaturgical and contextual approaches to modelling interaction. Perspectives on interpersonal infl uence are also covered, such as techniques extracted from Dale Carnegie's 'How to Win Friends and In fluence People', and a brief dive into the world of neuro-linguistic programming. In each case, implications for designers are highlighted and summarized at the end of the paper.

Commitments, norms and custard creams – a social influence approach to reducing did not attends (DNAs)

Commitments, norms and custard creams – a social influence approach to reducing did not attends (DNAs)

Making the unbearable bearable

Compassion isn't even a dirty word in the National Health Service since it is a behaviour that, according to popular belief, isn't displayed by clinicians who are too preoccupied with targets, efficiency drives, and restructuring to care for their patients—in the Florence Nightingale sense. A spoonful of compassion helps the medicine go down but also helps nudge your institution's performance on patient satisfaction surveys in the right direction. These attacks on heartless unfeeling clinicians are a little unkind; plenty of compassion is displayed every minute of every day although admittedly not enough. Ken Schwartz, an American lawyer who died in his 40s from lung cancer, wrote in the Boston Globe that ‘the smallest acts of kindness made the unbearable bearable.’ Schwartz was grateful for the care and compassion he received during his illness, a sentiment that perhaps too few patients are able to share. Clinicians are expected to control their emotions, a stiff upper lip preferable to a wobbly precursor to a tearful outburst.1 The debate on compassion in healthcare focuses rightly on patient experience, although the emotional needs of clinical staff are usually forgotten and addressing them may lead to benefits for patients. Illness or death can profoundly affect carers yet where is the debate on compassion towards staff? What of their emotional trauma? As our clinical lives become more disjointed and insecure, the wellbeing of staff will be increasingly difficult to maintain.2 Schwartz's family were so grateful for the care he received that they set up a legacy to support monthly meetings where staff freely, and confidentially, discuss their feelings about the care of a particular patient. Known as Schwartz Rounds, these meetings have become established in the United States and are now being introduced in the United Kingdom. A pilot study in two trusts suggests that Schwartz Rounds are a source of support for participants, benefit patients and team working, and have potential to change hospital culture.3 These are bold claims for a fascinating initiative. Failing that, a social influence approach based on nudge theory and custard creams might be worth considering.4

Developing a school-based drug prevention program to overcome barriers to effective program implementation: The CLIMATE schools: Alcohol module

Although effective school-based alcohol prevention programs do exist, the overall efficacy of these programs has been compromised by implementation failure. The CLIMATE Schools: Alcohol Module was developed to overcome some of the obstacles to high fidelity program implementation. This paper details this development of the CLIMATE Schools: Alcohol Module. The development involved two stages, both of which were considered essential. The first stage, involved reviewing the literature to ensure the program was based on the most effecttive pedagogy and health promotion practice and the second stage involved collaborating with teachers, students and specialists in the area of alcohol and other drugs, to ensure these goals were realised. The final CLIMATE Schools: Alcohol Module consists of computer-driven harm minimisation program which is based on a social influence approach. The program consists of six lessons, each with two components. The first component involves students completing an interactive computer-based program, with the second consisting of a variety of individual, small group and class-based activities. This program was developed to provide an innovative new platform for the delivery of drug education and has proven to be both feasible and effective in the school environment. The success of this program is considered to be testament to this collaborative development approach.

Evaluation of a peer-led smoking prevention programme for Romanian adolescents

The goal of this study was to assess the effects of a school-based smoking prevention programme that used both a video and peer-led discussion groups among Romanian junior high school students aged 13-14 years. The programme embraced the social influence approach and concentrated on enhancing self-efficacy and the acquisition of cigarette refusal skills. Twenty schools were randomly assigned to the control and experimental conditions, resulting in 55 participating classes from the seventh grade (28 in the control group and 27 in the experimental group). Pretest and 9 months follow-up data on weekly smoking initiation and psychosocial variables were collected from 1071 students. Multilevel logistic regression analyses demonstrated a significant effect of the programme on adolescents' smoking behaviour after 9 months. At post-test, weekly smoking onset was 4.5% in the experimental group versus 9.5% in the control group. Furthermore, the programme had significant effects on smoking-related beliefs. In the experimental group, this resulted in a more negative attitude towards smoking, increased social self-efficacy levels and a more negative intention towards smoking. These findings show that short-term effects of the smoking prevention programme can be realized in Romania. More studies are needed to analyse how to maintain these effects over time.

The effectiveness of a school-based substance abuse prevention program: 18-Month follow-up of the EU-Dap cluster randomized controlled trial

Aim To evaluate the effectiveness of a school-based substance abuse prevention program developed in the EU-Dap study (EUropean Drug Addiction Prevention trial). Materials and methods Cluster Randomized Controlled Trial. Seven European countries participated in the study; 170 schools (7079 pupils 12–14 years of age) were randomly assigned to one of three experimental conditions or to a control condition during the school year 2004/2005. The program consisted of a 12-h curriculum based on a comprehensive social influence approach. A pre-test survey assessing past and current substance use was conducted before the implementation of the program, while a post-test survey was carried out about 18 months after the pre-test. The association between program condition and change in substance use at post-test was expressed as adjusted prevalence odds ratio (POR), estimated by multilevel regression models. Results Persisting beneficial program effects were found for episodes of drunkenness (any, POR = 0.80; 0.67–0.97; frequent, POR = 0.62; 0.47–0.81) and for frequent cannabis use in the past 30 days (POR = 0.74; 0.53–1.00), whereas daily cigarette smoking was not affected by the program as it was at the short-term follow-up. Baseline non-smokers that participated in the program progressed in tobacco consumption to a lower extent than those in the control condition, but no difference was detected in the proportion of quitters or reducers among baseline daily smokers. Conclusion The experimental evaluation of an innovative school curriculum based on a comprehensive social influence approach, indicated persistent positive effects over 18 months for alcohol abuse and for cannabis use, but not for cigarette smoking.

Mediated, moderated and direct effects of country of residence, age, and gender on the cognitive and social determinants of adolescent smoking in Spain and the UK: a cross-sectional study

BackgroundEuropean trans-national adolescent smoking prevention interventions based on social influences approaches have had limited success. The attitudes-social influences-efficacy (ASE) model is a social cognition model that states smoking behaviour is determined by smoking intention which, in turn, is predicted by seven ASE determinants; disadvantages, advantages, social acceptance, social norms, modelling, perceived pressure, self-efficacy. Distal factors such as country of residence, age and gender are external to the model. The ASE model is, thus, closely related to the Theory of Planned Behaviour. This study assessed the utility of the ASE model using cross-sectional data from Spanish and UK adolescents.MethodsIn 1997, questionnaires were simultaneously administered to Spanish (n = 3716) and UK adolescents (n = 3715) who were considered at high risk of smoking. Participants' age, gender, smoking intentions and ASE determinant scores were identified and linear regression analysis was used to examine the mediated, moderated and direct effects of country of residence, age and gender on participants' smoking intentions.ResultsAll UK participants were aged 12 or 13 and most Spanish participants were aged between 12 and 14 (range 12–16 years). Amongst 12 and 13 year olds, regular smoking was more common in Spain. Almost half the participants were female (47.2% in Spain; 49.9% in the UK). Gender did not vary significantly according to age.The distribution of ASE determinant scores varied by country and predicted intention. The influence of each ASE determinant on intention was moderated by country. Country had a large direct influence on intention (1.72 points on a 7 point scale) but the effects of age and gender were mediated by the ASE determinants.The findings suggest resisting peer pressure interventions could potentially influence smoking amongst UK adolescents but not Spanish adolescents. Interventions that promote self-efficacy, on the other hand, would possibly have a greater influence on smoking amongst Spanish adolescents.ConclusionThe ASE model may not capture important cultural factors related to adolescent smoking and the relative contribution of particular ASE determinants to adolescent smoking intentions may differ between countries. Future European trans-national adolescent smoking prevention programmes may benefit from greater undestanding of country-level cultural norms.

‘Unplugged’: A new European school programme against substance abuse

This paper presents the rationale, development and application of ‘Unplugged’, a new school programme for the prevention of substance abuse, which is based on the comprehensive social influence approach (CSI). The programme was developed, implemented and evaluated by a cross-disciplinary group of experts in the frame of a multi-centre study in seven European countries. The basic curriculum consists of 12 units, which are delivered by class teachers to a target population of 12–14 year-old students. Additional programme components were workshops for the students’ parents and debriefing sessions led by class peers. The programme's application was monitored by means of structured report forms. This process monitoring allowed for the analysis of problems in implementation, as well as of participatory aspects.‘Unplugged’ is the first comprehensive social influence school curriculum in Europe of which the efficacy has been evaluated in a field trial, and it also constitutes an example of a theory- and evidence-based programme against youths’ substance use. This report can provide public health and school decision makers with tools to make an informed choice on these kinds of programmes and to survey their application.

Relational Distance and the Acceptance of Mental Health Evaluations: A Social Influence Approach to Deviant Labeling

Research on labeling has been criticized for neglecting individual-level responses to being labeled. The authors examine labeling as social influence, focusing on the “relational distance” between the labeler and the labelee and how this affects the labelee's “avowal,” or acceptance, of mental evaluations. The authors report results showing that participants more strongly accepted mental evaluations from a randomly assigned, less relationally distant evaluator, regardless of either participants' actual depression levels or the content of randomly assigned mental evaluations. The authors discuss the implications of their findings for understanding race differences in reactions to labeling and for integrating labeling arguments with ideas concerning re-integrative shaming.

A cluster randomized controlled trial of school-based prevention of tobacco, alcohol and drug use: The EU-Dap design and study population

Background The empirical evidence of effectiveness of many school-based programs against substance abuse is rather weak. The EU-Dap study is a multicenter cluster randomized community trial (CRCT) designed to evaluate such a program. This paper presents study design and baseline characteristics of the study population. Methods 170 schools from 9 centers from seven countries (Austria, Belgium, Germany, Greece, Italy, Spain, Sweden), stratified according to average social status in the catchment area, were randomized to either three variants of the active intervention (basic curriculum, basic with peer involvement, and basic with parent involvement) or to a control group. The program under evaluation is based on a comprehensive social influence approach, and was delivered during the scholar year 2004–2005 to a population of 12- to 14-year-old students attending junior high school. An anonymous questionnaire administered before and after the intervention was used to track behavioral and attitudinal changes. Results All in all, we included in the study 143 schools and 7079 students, of which 3547 in the intervention groups and 3532 in the control group. At baseline, 34.9% of students had smoked cigarettes, 24.7% had been drunk, and 8.9% had used cannabis at least once in life. Discussion EU-Dap is the first European multicenter randomized study to evaluate the effectiveness of a school program targeting tobacco, alcohol and drug use. The baseline assessment showed high prevalence and wide geographical variations of substance use.

Optimization and Its Alternative in Media Choice: A Model of Reliance on Social-Influence Processes

In the reconciliation of rational-choice and social-influence approaches to media choice offered here, the choice process is decomposed into two subprocesses. In the first subprocess—that of rational choice—decisional ambiguity frustrates complete optimization. Optimization is partial, yielding a set of effectively interchangeable media alternatives over which the user is indecisive. In the second subprocess—that of social influence—imitation, deference, and other cues act on the set of interchangeables, yielding a single ultimate choice. If in the social-influence subprocess there are benefits to coordinating with others, group choice crystallizes around a single media alternative. If these benefits are absent, individual choice remains idiosyncratic, with each decision maker making random choices within the set of interchangeables. In organizational life, media choice transpires sequentially, with each choice conditioning a succeeding one. In its dynamic form, the present model explicitly incorporates such sequential environments: The twofold choice process transpires iteratively within individual decision sites (in the multiple purchasing decisions of a committee, for example) and sequentially across decision sites (from committee to individual, for example). The model generates considerable empirical implications. As decisional ambiguity grows, the rational-choice component of the choice process shrinks, implying upper-bound conditions for the explanatory power of rational-choice statistical models.

A meta-analysis of teen cigarette smoking cessation.

This article presents a meta-analysis of 48 teen cigarette smoking cessation studies, the 1st meta-analysis of its kind. The authors conducted searches of electronic databases and unpublished manuscripts from 1970 to 2003. Fifty contextual elements were coded from each article. A weighted least squares random effects method was used to pool results from individual study net effects estimates. Multilevel random coefficients modeling was applied to control for the intrastudy variation. The primary outcome for the present analysis was quit rate. Data were entered as intent-to-treat (ITT) quit rates (not compliance sample rates). Overall treatment effect size and treatment effect sizes as a function of program content, modality, number of sessions, and length of follow-up were examined. Across studies, program conditions, compared with control conditions, appeared to give smokers a 2.90% (95% confidence interval = 1.47-4.35%) absolute advantage in quitting, increasing the probability of quitting by approximately 46% (9.14% vs. 6.24%). Relatively higher quit rates were found in programs that included a motivation enhancement component, cognitive-behavioral techniques, and social influence approaches. Also, relatively higher quit rates were found in school-based clinic and classroom modalities. Furthermore, relatively higher quit rates were found for programs consisting of at least 5 quit sessions. Data also indicated that the effects were maintained at short-term (1 year or less) and longer term (longer than 1 year) follow-ups. Much more teen smoking cessation research is needed, but teen smoking cessation programming is effective, and the present study provides a framework to move forward.

Evaluation of the school‐based smoking‐prevention program “BE smokeFREE”

This article examines the impact of the school-based smoking-prevention program "BE smokeFREE" on adolescent smoking. A national representative sample of 99 schools (195 classes, 4,441 students) was used when the intervention started in November 1994. Schools were allocated to one of four groups: a comparison group (A) and three intervention groups (B, C, and D). Group B received the most comprehensive intervention. A baseline (autumn 1994) and three follow-up data collections (1995, 1996, and 1997) were conducted. There were no significant differences in smoking habits among the four groups at baseline. The smoking habits in the group that was involved in the most comprehensive intervention (group B) changed more favourably than those of students in the comparison schools over the three follow-up data collections. At the third follow-up, the proportion of students smoking weekly or more in the comparison group was 29.2%, compared with 19.6% in the model intervention group. The two less comprehensive interventions (no teacher in-service courses in group C, and no involvement of parents in group D) appeared to be less effective than the model intervention. Multilevel multiple logistic regression analyses, comparing changes in smoking habits between students in group B with those among students in the comparison schools, confirm the conclusion that the comprehensive intervention was the most effective. This school-based intervention, based on a social influence approach, proved to be effective at reducing smoking rates among participants.

Influence of known psychosocial smoking risk factors on Egyptian adolescents' cigarette smoking behavior

The morbidity and mortality associated with cigarette smoking is shifting from the developed world to developing countries, especially developing Arab countries. One such country is Egypt, which has the highest rate of tobacco consumption in the Arab world. To curb the rising smoking epidemic in Egypt, appropriate adolescent smoking prevention programs need to be developed. Most of the effective adolescent smoking prevention programs are based on the social influence approach, which targets the proximal psychosocial variables believed to promote adolescent smoking. However, most of our understanding of adolescents' psychosocial smoking risk factors is based mainly on Western studies. Whether these factors have the same influence on Egyptian adolescents' smoking behavior has not been investigated to date. An understanding of the psychosocial correlates of smoking behavior among Egyptian adolescents may help in designing the appropriate smoking prevention program aimed at this population. This study reports the results of a cross-sectional survey administered to a random sample of 1930 students in grades 7, 9 and 12 in the city of Alexandria, Egypt, in May 2003. Adolescent smoking behavior was positively associated with positive beliefs about smoking, sibling, parent and peer smoking, and social smoking norms, with sibling smoking and perceived adult smoking norms having a stronger influence on adolescents' smoking behavior than peer smoking and perceived peer smoking norms. Refusal self-efficacy was protective against smoking behavior, while knowledge of the short-term negative consequences of smoking was protective against susceptibility to future smoking among females only. The results suggest that adolescents from collective cultures, like Egypt, are more influenced by their family's smoking behavior and perceived adult smoking norms than their peers' smoking behavior and perceived peer smoking norms. Smoking prevention programs aimed at Egyptian adolescents should be accompanied by smoking cessation programs for the family and adult community members.