Perceived social norms of health behaviours and college engagement in British students

Abstract

Community Engagement ManagerTech Stories * Corresponding author 2 Perceived social norms of health behaviours and college engagement in British students Abstract AimsThe social norms approach is an increasingly widely used strategy of behaviour and attitude change that is based on challenging misperceptions individuals hold about their peers. Research to date has been carried out predominately in the American college system, with a focus on substance use behaviours. The aim of the current study was to explore peer perceptions of both substance use and other behaviours in a British student sample, as the first step of determining whether the social norms approach may be applicable within Europe. MethodsStudents at eight Further Education colleges in the UK were surveyed on their personal and perceived peer health and college engagement behaviours and attitudes by means of a printed and online survey. ResultsRespondents reported a perceived norm of frequency of substance use that was higher than the reported norm. Results relating to the injunctive norms of substance use were mixed but demonstrated that the majority of respondents do not actively approve of tobacco, cannabis or other drug use. Respondents also reported a norm of academic engagement that was more positive than the perceived norm of their peers. ConclusionsThe results around substance use are consistent with work conducted in the American college system, despite the differences in culture and legislation. In addition there results indicate that there 3 may be similar misperceptions around other areas of health and college engagement. This suggests that the social norms approach may be a viable method of behaviour change in UK students.

A Critical Appraisal of the Social Norms Approach as an Interventional Strategy for Health-Related Behavior and Attitude Change

“…Overestimations of social norms have been evidenced for drinking sugar-sweetened beverages ( Perkins J.M. et al, 2010 ; Lally et al, 2011 ), eating unhealthy snacks ( Lally et al, 2011 ), using ‘smart drugs’ to improve academic performance at university ( Helmer et al, 2016b ), using non-medically prescribed sedatives and sleeping pills ( Lehne et al, 2018 ), engaging in distracted driving behavior ( Carter et al, 2014 ), risky sexual behaviors ( Lewis et al, 2007 ; McAlaney and Jenkins, 2017 ), as well as overestimating the rates of sexually transmitted infections and unintended pregnancies amongst peers ( Scholly et al, 2005 ). Misperceived social norms can influence perceptions of what is considered to be a healthy or attractive body image, such as misperceptions of peer desirability of thinness and muscularity ( Grossbard et al, 2011 ).…”

Theory and practice of social norms interventions: eight common pitfalls

“…The first “social norms interventions” were originally used to reduce alcohol consumption in a few US universities in the early 1980s by correcting students’ overestimates of how much other students drink [ 24 ]. Later, more campuses (mostly in the US, Canada, and the UK) used similar interventions to address tobacco use [ 25 ], sexual violence [ 26 , 27 ], and use of recreational drugs [ 28 ].…”

Using social norms theory for health promotion in low-income countries

“…Even though empirical findings in the health sciences have offered ground-breaking contributions to our understanding of the influence of social norms on a wide range of health outcomes (e.g. Piliavin and Libby, 1986;Peterson et al, 2009;Gidycz et al, 2011;McAlaney and Jenkins, 2015;Berger and Caravita, 2016;Prestwich et al, 2016;Templeton et al, 2016), most of these empirical findings emerge from studies conducted in highincome countries; the most famous case being the use of social norms theory to reduce use of alcohol and recreational drugs in US college campuses (Borsari and Carey, 2003; Lewis and Neighbors, 2006;Prestwich et al, 2016). This narrow evidence base is particularly problematic given donors' and practitioners' recent interest in integrating social norms theory into health interventions in LMIC.…”

“…Contemporary research in health science has empirically demonstrated the usefulness of the third, 'norms as beliefs', school of thought, which emerged mostly from social psychology (e.g. Cialdini et al, 1990), as a means to explain and also to influence people's health-related choices (Borsari and Carey, 2003;Eisenberg et al, 2005;Rimal and Real, 2005;McAlaney and Jenkins, 2015;Ahmed et al, 2016). Contemporary scholars in this tradition argue that social norms are one's beliefs about (i) what others do and (ii) of what others approve and disapprove of (Gibbs, 1965;Cialdini et al, 1991;Cialdini and Trost, 1998;Lapinski and Rimal, 2005;Bicchieri, 2006; for a full review see Mackie et al, 2015).…”