Interested constituents: identifying groups to mobilize in community organizing efforts to strengthen alcohol control policies

ABSTRACT

Background: Policy support research identifies demographic profiles of those who support policies, but community organizers aim to mobilize groups with an existing structure. Thus, identifying established groups that support alcohol policies may aid organizing efforts.

Objective: This paper calculates prevalence and odds of policy support among three potential constituency groups (i.e., religious affiliation, persons harmed by others’ drinking, and persons in recovery from alcohol) for three policies: alcohol tax increases, banning alcohol in corner stores, and universal coverage for alcohol treatment.

Methods: Using the 2014–15 National Alcohol Survey (n = 3,444; 1,457 male, 1,987 female) and logistic regression, this study explores associations between constituency groups and policy support.

Results: Support was higher for the individual-level strategy of alcohol treatment (80.8%) than raising taxes (27.5%) and banning sales in corner stores (52.2%). Support for taxes was higher among persons who valued religion highly (vs not; aOR = 1.46, p < .01), persons harmed by others’ drinking (vs not; aOR = 1.71, p < .001), and persons in recovery (vs. not; aOR = 1.76, p = .02); Catholics had lower odds of support for taxes (vs no denomination; aOR = 0.63, p = .01). Persons who valued religion highly (aOR = 1.53, p < .001), Protestants (aOR = 1.63, p < .01), Catholics (aOR = 1.46, p = .03), and persons with other religious denominations (aOR = 2.17, p = .02) had higher odds of supporting bans in corner stores. Only those in recovery showed greater support for treatment (aOR = 3.20, p < .001).

Conclusion: Overall, support was lower for population-wide approaches, but results revealed constituency groups that supported these policies. These groups may be allies to organizers who seek to reduce population-level alcohol consumption and harms.

KEYWORDS:

• Public opinion
• alcohol policy
• alcohol control
• treatment access
• community organizing

Data availability

Datasets and codebooks from the U.S. National Alcohol Survey Series can be requested here: http://arg.org/nas-datasets/.

Disclosures

Drs. Trangenstein and Greenfield have received research and/or travel support from the National Alcohol Beverage Control Association.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by Award Numbers T32AA007240 (Graduate Research Training in Alcohol Problems: Alcohol-Related Disparities) and P50AA005595 (Epidemiology of Alcohol Problems: Alcohol-Related Disparities) from the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism. The content is solely the responsibility of the authors and does not necessarily represent the official view of the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism or the National Institutes of Health. The supporting institutions had no role in the study design, collection, analysis or interpretation of the data, writing of the manuscript, or the decision to submit the manuscript for publication.