Rethink current alcohol campaign

Much has been made of the Office of Student Health's "Four or Fewer" advertising campaign, which states that most Penn students have four or fewer drinks when they party. Unfortunately, data from University surveys indicate that the campaign doesn't seem to be having a large effect on Penn's undergraduate student body and their drinking habits. Therefore, Penn should redirect its efforts, focusing more on funding and promoting events on campus that could offer students legitimate alternatives to drinking.

The Office of Health Education's ad campaigns are useful in that they offer some guidelines about drinking -- that drinking slowly and making sure to eat and drink water, as well, are keys to staying healthy and having a good time. Their premise, that working on how students drink as opposed to telling them simply not to drink, is also a realistic one.

However, these "social norms" campaigns, in use at nearly half of America's four-year colleges, simply do not appear to be having a significant impact. Nationally, the 2003 College Alcohol Study at Harvard's School of Public Health asserts this, and locally, Penn's undergraduate surveys indicate that while Penn students' drinking habits have fluctuated since the campaigns were introduced, they have not changed significantly. While Penn may cite examples where such campaigns were successful, on a large scale they do not succeed.

These campaigns are predicated on research that suggests that college students often believe that their peers drink more than they actually do, and that this belief impacts their own drinking habits. However, rather than convince students that their friends are exaggerating, we think that Penn should focus its efforts on offering and promoting more, and a greater variety of, weekend alternatives that both nondrinkers and drinkers alike would enjoy.

There are already a ton of things to do on this campus that are alternatives to drinking. No Penn students should feel compelled to go to a party they may not be thrilled about simply because "there's nothing else to do." Concerts, comedy shows, poker nights, club sports, speakers and the like draw all varieties of students. Increasing the number of these types of events, and increasing promotion of the events that already go on, may have a greater impact than the social norms campaign has so far.

Even if the University does not consider this a viable alternative, a serious examination of the current alcohol policy is necessary. Given that Penn's own evaluations have shown that the current advertising strategy has not yielded significant results, serious consideration should be given to an alternative approach.

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