Harms to Others from Drinking Among College Students (H2O) Study
What are Harms to Others from Drinking?
Secondhand or collateral harms from alcohol (also known as alcohol harms to others or AHTO) include subjective and objective harms attributable to others’ drinking that occur in the social environment, including everything from interrupted studying and caretaking of other students to assault and other physical harms.
Previous studies (from the late 1990s) found that more than half of college students experienced harms from others’ drinking. Students who do not drink heavily or abstain from alcohol are vulnerable to being adversely affected. The critical barrier to addressing harms from others among college students is the lack of comprehensive studies among today’s college students.
What is the H2O Study?
We are interested in examining how college students are directly or indirectly affected by the drinking of those around them (e.g. their family, dorm mates, classmates, friends). In particular, our survey study focuses on various harms resulting from others’ drinking behavior.
Young people ages 18-24 suffer disproportionately from alcohol-related harm, including harms caused by other peoples’ drinking, and college students are at particularly high risk. This study investigates the range and magnitude of harms to college students from others’ drinking, including characteristics of college students, their social environments, and on-campus and state alcohol policy environments that might influence their chances of experiencing such harms. The results will support refining and implementing existing evidence-based interventions that help protect college students from harms caused by other people’s drinking.
To this end, the H2O Study fielded the College Alcohol Harms to Others (CAHTO) Survey from October 2021 to December 2021.
Sampling
The sample was selected using a two-stage, probability-based sample selection process, where colleges and universities were selected at stage 1 and students within the selected schools were selected at stage 2.
The sample frame at stage 1 consisted of 2,346 colleges and universities in the United States. A random sample of 61 colleges/universities was selected from the sample frame using a probability proportionate to size, random sample selection methodology where size was defined as the number of undergraduates within each school and strata were defined by geographic region (i.e. Midwest, Northeast, South, West) and institution type (i.e. 2-year, 4-year). Forty-six (46) of the 61 selected colleges and universities agreed to participate in the survey.
Only second year (sophomores) and third year (juniors) students, ages 18 to 24 years old, were eligible to participate in the survey. Each participating school was asked to randomly select 330 eligible students, oversampling for Black and Latinx students.
Analytical sample
The H2O Study has an analytical sample consisting of 1,978 student-respondents across 45 institutions, excluding invalid responses. Each participating school had a median of 47 participating students (mean=43).
Grant Funder
The National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism funded the H2O Study (R01AA025980). The content on this website is solely the responsibility of the authors and does not necessarily represent the official views of the National Institutes of Health.
Institutional Review
Boston University Medical Center Institutional Review Board reviewed and approved the H2O Study protocol, designating it as “Exempt” under the Revised Common Rule [45 CFR 46.104(d)(2)] due to the manner by which we collect data and de-link each student’s personally identifiable information (PII) from survey responses.