Mifflin County Communities That Care®

“The social norms approach has become one of the most talked about health promotion strategies in recent years. Known primarily for its application to college student drinking, it has become an increasingly popular topic among community and high school substance abuse prevention specialists who are looking for an evidence-based alternative to ineffective intervention strategies, or to supplement strategies with limited impact.

“For many years, prevention efforts were based entirely on reactive strategies. In other words, problem behaviors had to occur before remedial actions were taken, with much of this work focused on assessment and diagnosis, rehabilitation programs for users and addicts, counseling or workshop sessions for offenders, or community service punishments.” In contrast, Social Norms is a proactive strategy to address potential problems before they occurred.

Social Norms is an environment approach that focuses on community-wide changes. “Environmental approaches generally take two directions. One of these is based on strategies that seek to change institutional and public policy, creating barriers or restrictions to access and increasing punitive measures to reduce problem behavior. The other environmental approach, widely known as social norms, uses accurate information about the social context, in the form of positive group norms, to affect widespread behavior change.

“The social norms approach to health promotion evolved from research documenting college students' misperceptions about peer drinking norms. The initial study revealed a consistent pattern of misperceptions held by students regarding the norms of alcohol use among their peers. Specifically, students typically thought that the norms for both the frequency and the quantity of drinking among their peers were higher than they actually were. In addition, students generally believed that their peers were more permissive in their personal attitudes about substance use than was in fact the case (Perkins and Berkowitz, 1986).”

To decrease underage drinking, we must challenge the misperceptions of what is “normal” to lessen peer pressure to engage in risky behavior. Good choices begin with accurate information. We invite you to join us in our campaign to celebrate the fact that “Most kids don’t”. The goal of Mifflin County Communities That Care is to relay to the community exactly what the youth have told us about themselves. We choose to emphasize the positive – for example, that 72% of those surveyed in Oct 2005 said they did not drink in the past month. Our strategy is to encourage youth who may think that “everyone else drinks but me” to realize that they actually are in the majority if they don’t drink!
Contrary to what many people think, the youth “norm” in Mifflin County is that most youth do not drink. However, it is interesting what our misperceptions are. For example, at the Chamber of Commerce’s Business Expo in May 2006, we recruited a random sample of 22 adults to complete a survey of ours. One question we asked was “Of students in the Mifflin County School District high school, what percentage do you think have used alcohol (a full drink or more) during the past 30 days?” Twenty-one of these 22 adults vastly overestimated the percentage, and the highest estimate was that 85% drink. Our goal, therefore, is to correct false perceptions.

The information quoted above was excerpted from A Guide to Marketing Social Norms for Health Promotion in Schools and Communities, which is a publication of the National Social Norms Resource Center. Read more about it at these related links:

Hobart and William Smith Alcohol Education Project Social Norms 101 Primer

National Social Norms Resource Center

Most of Us campaign (Montana Model of Social Norms Marketing)