Stepped Care for Mandated College Students

September 20, 2016 updated by: Brian Borsari, National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism (NIAAA)
This project provides stepped care to college students mandated for alcohol-related offenses. Students are first provided with a minimal intervention, a 15-minute discussion of their alcohol use. Students who continue to drink in a risky manner are provided with a more intensive, hour-long brief motivational interview. By providing more intensive treatment to the students who exhibit risky drinking, we hope to maximize the efficiency of campus alcohol programs.

Study Overview

Status

Completed

Conditions

Intervention / Treatment

Detailed Description

Colleges and universities have seen a large increase in the number of students referred to the administration for the violation of alcohol policies. However, research indicates that the majority of mandated students may not require extensive treatment. Stepped care assigns individuals to different levels of care according to their response to treatment. Encouraging research indicates that minimal interventions and BMIs may reduce heavy drinking in mandated college students. Thus, implementing stepped care using these interventions could maximize treatment efficiency and reduce the demands on campus alcohol programs.

Participants will be students mandated to attend an alcohol program at a northeastern private university. All participants will receive Step 1, a 15-minute minimal intervention including a discussion of the referral incident and the provision of a booklet containing advice to reduce drinking. Participants will be assessed six weeks later, and those continuing to exhibit risky alcohol use will receive Step 2, randomization to: (a) a 60-90 minute brief motivational intervention (BMI) or (b) an assessment-only control. All students will complete 3, 6, and 9 month follow-up assessments. The three groups will be compared on two outcome measures: frequency of binge drinking episodes and alcohol-related problems in the past 30 days. Predictors of treatment response (readiness to change, alcohol expectancies, age of first drink, sensation seeking, descriptive norms, and reaction to the referral) will also be evaluated for both steps of the intervention. Research findings will assist college alcohol programs in determining the most effective and efficient allocation of their limited resources in treating mandated students. The long-term objectives of this research are to inform preventive intervention research about the utility and cost-effectiveness of stepped-care approaches and to identify individual and situational factors that qualify these effects.

Study Type

Interventional

Enrollment (Actual)

598

Phase

  • Phase 1

Contacts and Locations

This section provides the contact details for those conducting the study, and information on where this study is being conducted.

Study Locations

  • United States
    • Rhode Island
      • Bristol, Rhode Island, United States, 02809
        • Roger Williams University

Participation Criteria

Researchers look for people who fit a certain description, called eligibility criteria. Some examples of these criteria are a person's general health condition or prior treatments.

Eligibility Criteria

Ages Eligible for Study

14 years and older (Adult, Older Adult)

Accepts Healthy Volunteers

No

Genders Eligible for Study

All

Description

Inclusion Criteria:

  • Male and female students 18 years of age or older.
  • Participants will have signed a witnessed informed consent.
  • Participants will have been referred for an alcohol-related offense

Exclusion Criteria:

  • Participants who meet current DSM-IV criteria for substance use disorder
  • Participants who are currently in treatment for substance use.

Study Plan

This section provides details of the study plan, including how the study is designed and what the study is measuring.

How is the study designed?

Design Details

  • Primary Purpose: Treatment
  • Allocation: Randomized
  • Interventional Model: Factorial Assignment
  • Masking: None (Open Label)

Arms and Interventions

Participant Group / Arm
Intervention / Treatment
Other: Step 1
Minimal Intervention
Behavioral: Step 1: Minimal Intervention
All participants will receive Step 1, a 15-minute minimal intervention including a discussion of the referral incident and the provision of a booklet containing advice to reduce drinking. Participants will be assessed six weeks later. All students will complete 3, 6, and 9 month follow-up assessments
Behavioral: Step 2: Brief Motivational Intervention
Participants continuing to exhibit risky alcohol use will receive Step 2, randomization to: (a) a 60-90 minute brief motivational intervention (BMI) or (b) an assessment-only control. All students will complete 3, 6, and 9 month follow-up assessments.
Active Comparator: Step 2-A
Brief motivational intervention (BMI)
Behavioral: Step 2: Brief Motivational Intervention
Participants continuing to exhibit risky alcohol use will receive Step 2, randomization to: (a) a 60-90 minute brief motivational intervention (BMI) or (b) an assessment-only control. All students will complete 3, 6, and 9 month follow-up assessments.
Active Comparator: Step 2-B
Assessment-only control
Behavioral: Alcohol Assessment
Participants continuing to exhibit risky alcohol use will receive Step 2, randomization to: (a) a 60-90 minute brief motivational intervention (BMI) or (b) an assessment-only control. All students will complete 3, 6, and 9 month follow-up assessments.

What is the study measuring?

Primary Outcome Measures

Outcome Measure
Time Frame
Alcohol consumption
Time Frame: 3, 6, and 9 months
3, 6, and 9 months
Alcohol-related consequences
Time Frame: 3, 6, and 9 months
3, 6, and 9 months

Secondary Outcome Measures

Outcome Measure
Time Frame
Predictors of response to treatment
Time Frame: 3, 6, and 9 months
3, 6, and 9 months

Collaborators and Investigators

This is where you will find people and organizations involved with this study.

Sponsor

National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism (NIAAA)

Investigators

  • Principal Investigator: Brian E. Borsari, PhD, Brown University

Publications and helpful links

The person responsible for entering information about the study voluntarily provides these publications. These may be about anything related to the study.

General Publications

Helpful Links

Study record dates

These dates track the progress of study record and summary results submissions to ClinicalTrials.gov. Study records and reported results are reviewed by the National Library of Medicine (NLM) to make sure they meet specific quality control standards before being posted on the public website.

Study Major Dates

Study Start

October 1, 2006

Primary Completion (Actual)

April 1, 2010

Study Completion (Actual)

June 1, 2011

Study Registration Dates

First Submitted

October 28, 2005

First Submitted That Met QC Criteria

October 28, 2005

First Posted (Estimate)

November 1, 2005

Study Record Updates

Last Update Posted (Estimate)

September 21, 2016

Last Update Submitted That Met QC Criteria

September 20, 2016

Last Verified

September 1, 2016

More Information

Terms related to this study

Keywords

Additional Relevant MeSH Terms

Other Study ID Numbers

  • NIAAABOR015518
  • NIH Grant R01 AA015518-01

This information was retrieved directly from the website clinicaltrials.gov without any changes. If you have any requests to change, remove or update your study details, please contact register@clinicaltrials.gov. As soon as a change is implemented on clinicaltrials.gov, this will be updated automatically on our website as well.

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