No Fear, Just Relax and Play: Social Anxiety, Alcohol Expectancies, and Drinking Games Among College Students

Abstract

Objective: The authors examined the association between social anxiety and drinking game (DG) involvement as well as the moderating role of social anxiety–relevant alcohol outcome expectancies (AOE) in social anxiety and DG involvement among college students. Participants: Participants were 715 students (74.8% women, M _age = 19.46, SD = 1.22) from 8 US colleges. Methods: Data were collected via self-report survey from Fall 2005 to Spring 2007. Results: Tension Reduction and Liquid Courage AOE moderated the association between social anxiety and DG participation. Tension Reduction AOE and DG participation were positively related among those with high social anxiety, but were associated negatively for those with low social anxiety. Liquid Courage AOE were associated with increased DG participation for those with low social anxiety, but not for those with high social anxiety. Conclusions: Findings suggest that social anxiety acts as a protective or a risk factor for DG participation among college students, depending upon AOE.

Keywords:

• social anxiety
• drinking games
• alcohol expectancies
• college drinking
• college students

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

The authors acknowledge all of the members of Drs Zamboanga's and Ham's research teams for their assistance with data collection and entry for this investigation. The authors also thank all of the collaborators who organized data collection from the multiple sites involved in this study: Drs Britton Brewer, Robert J. Smith, Margaret Marshall, and Rodger Narloch.