An Intervention to Decrease Heavy Episodic Drinking in College Students: The Effect of Executive Function Training

Abstract

Objective: To develop and test a planning-ability, executive function (EF) intervention to reduce heavy episodic drinking (HED). Participants: Fifty-five heavy-drinking, first-year college students, recruited from May to October 2012. Methods: Participants were randomly allocated to an experimental or active control group and then completed the Alcohol Use Disorders Identification Test–Consumption and demographic questions. Over 1 week, the experimental group completed 4 progressively harder planning tasks, whereas the control group completed 4 easier, consistent-difficulty planning tasks. Participants then recorded their daily alcohol consumption for 2 weeks. Results: As hypothesized, both mean and maximum per-occasion alcohol consumption was significantly reduced in the experimental group compared with the control group. There were no significant differences in frequency of HED. Conclusions: These results provide initial support for the use of a planning-ability intervention in decreasing per-occasion alcohol consumption. Future researchers can examine the mechanism of effect, the long-term efficacy, and the specific EFs involved in other aspects of alcohol consumption.

Keywords:

• alcohol
• binge drinking
• executive function
• heavy episodic drinking
• planning
• self-regulation

Notes

* Due to the incremental nature of the training, the difficulty level of the final Tower of London task completed differed between groups. Therefore, it was not possible to examine changes in planning ability in the current study.