Alcohol PBS and Thinking About the Past

NCT ID: NCT05208593

Last Updated: 2023-04-13

Basic Information

• Recruitment Status: COMPLETED
• Clinical Phase: NA
• Total Enrollment: 413 participants
• Study Classification: INTERVENTIONAL
• Study Start Date: 2022-02-15
• Study Completion Date: 2022-12-30

Brief Summary

Individuals often think of how a situation or outcome could have turned out differently -- if only something was different or something had changed, then the outcome could have been better or worse. This is a common type of thinking, known as counterfactual thinking, that often takes the form of "if only" statements. These thoughts are frequent after negative events, but have also been found to occur after positive events and 'near misses'. Research has shown that their evaluative nature elicits a variety of consequences, such as biased decision making, changes in an event's meaningfulness, heightened positive or negative affect, and future behavioral changes (such as intentions, motivation, persistence/effort. Specifically, many areas of research involving counterfactuals have often looked into key elements that are often discussed in other health behavior literature, such as self-efficacy, motivation, and intentions. One such area that incorporates these elements is health promotion literature, such as Protective Behavioral Strategies (PBS) and alcohol consumption. The objectives of this study are laid out as such: First, to further explore the role counterfactuals play in increasing an individual's intentions toward behavioral change. Second, to further elucidate the inner and outer workings of Protective Behavioral Strategies for increasing positive health behaviors. Finally, to address the applicability of a counterfactual intervention on promoting intentions to use PBS.

Conditions

Alcohol Drinking in College

Study Design

• Allocation Method: RANDOMIZED
• Intervention Model: PARALLEL
• Primary Study Purpose: TREATMENT
• Blinding Strategy: SINGLE

Study Groups

Negative Event Only

Participants will be asked to think of a specific example of the most (or one of the most) negative, unpleasant event with alcohol they have experienced; the event they choose must have occurred at least a year ago. Or they will be asked to think of the most significant event that has occurred in the past year. After thinking of a specific event, they will be given three minutes to write about their experience. The writing prompt will ask that they express the event information in a few sentences. This writing prompt will help participants place themselves back into that moment and access salient emotions and cognition about it. Similar negative event prompts have been used in counterfactual thinking studies (McFarland \& Alvaro, 2000; White \& Lehman, 2005).

Group Type: PLACEBO_COMPARATOR

Negative Event Only

Intervention Type: BEHAVIORAL

Participants are asked to write about a negative event related to alcohol and write about it

Negative Event + Factual Thinking Task

Participants in this group, the event plus the factual thinking task condition, will be told the following after completing the negative event writing task, "After disappointing and/or negative experiences like the one you described on the previous page, people often think about the details of the situation. For example, when it happened, who was involved, and what happened right before or after the incident occurred. In the space below please provide examples of some of these details.." There will be 10 blank boxes below the instructions and participants will be asked to provide some examples of details from their traumatic event. They will be asked to only list as many as they can naturally recall without repeating any. This procedure is derived from Kray and colleague's (2010) study on counterfactual thinking and meaning in life.

Group Type: ACTIVE_COMPARATOR

Negative Event + Factual Thinking Task

Intervention Type: BEHAVIORAL

Active Control condition where participants write about a negative event and list three facts about it

Negative Event + Counterfactual Task

Participants will be told after completing the negative event writing task, "After disappointing and/or negative experiences like the one you described, people sometimes cannot help thinking "what if…" or "if only…" and imagining how things might have gone differently. That is, if only I had done something differently, the negative drinking situation could have been avoided or turned out better. In the box below please identify things that, had they been different, would have improved the outcome of the negative drinking situation you described earlier and briefly describe how the outcome would have been better." Participants will be asked to list three counterfactuals about the event. Participants will also be asked to think of situations where these strategies could be used, to list out any obstacles that might prevent them from implementing these strategies and to indicate their intention to use each strategy over the next week.

Group Type: EXPERIMENTAL

Negative Event + Counterfactual Task

Intervention Type: BEHAVIORAL

Participants will complete a counterfactual based intervention where they come up with three if only..then statements about how a past drinking behavior could have been altered to be better and to think about protective behavioral strategies that they could use in a future similar situation to make the outcome better.

Personalized Normative Feedback

Participants in this group, the personalized normative feedback, will be asked to rate the frequency and quantity of TAMU students that use PBS when drinking.

Group Type: EXPERIMENTAL

Personalized Normative Feedback

Intervention Type: BEHAVIORAL

Participants will be asked to rate the frequency and quantity of students who use protective behavioral strategies while drinking. They will be given feedback on how close their estimate is from the national averages.

Interventions

Negative Event + Counterfactual Task

Participants will complete a counterfactual based intervention where they come up with three if only..then statements about how a past drinking behavior could have been altered to be better and to think about protective behavioral strategies that they could use in a future similar situation to make the outcome better.

Intervention Type: BEHAVIORAL

Personalized Normative Feedback

Participants will be asked to rate the frequency and quantity of students who use protective behavioral strategies while drinking. They will be given feedback on how close their estimate is from the national averages.

Intervention Type: BEHAVIORAL

Negative Event + Factual Thinking Task

Active Control condition where participants write about a negative event and list three facts about it

Intervention Type: BEHAVIORAL

Negative Event Only

Participants are asked to write about a negative event related to alcohol and write about it

Intervention Type: BEHAVIORAL

Eligibility Criteria

Inclusion Criteria

• minimum age of 18 years

Exclusion Criteria

• no exclusions at baseline
• participants who do not follow the instructions for the specific writing task will be unable to sign-up for the remaining follow up sessions (Parts 2-6) and will be excluded the final data analyses

• Minimum Eligible Age: 18 Years
• Eligible Sex: ALL
• Accepts Healthy Volunteers: Yes

Sponsors

University of Central Florida

OTHER

Sponsor Role: collaborator

Texas A&M University

OTHER

Sponsor Role: lead

Responsible Party

Sherecce A Fields

Professor

Responsibility Role: PRINCIPAL_INVESTIGATOR

Principal Investigators

Rob Dvorak, PhD

Role: PRINCIPAL_INVESTIGATOR

University of Central Florida

Rachel Smallman, PhD

Role: PRINCIPAL_INVESTIGATOR

Texas A&M University

Sherecce Fields, PhD

Role: PRINCIPAL_INVESTIGATOR

Texas A&M University

Locations

Texas A&M University

College Station, Texas, United States

Countries

United States

References

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Reference Type: BACKGROUND

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Reference Type: BACKGROUND

PMID: 17185302 (View on PubMed)

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Reference Type: BACKGROUND

PMID: 21272356 (View on PubMed)

Epstude K, Roese NJ. The functional theory of counterfactual thinking. Pers Soc Psychol Rev. 2008 May;12(2):168-92. doi: 10.1177/1088868308316091.

Reference Type: BACKGROUND

PMID: 18453477 (View on PubMed)

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Reference Type: BACKGROUND

PMID: 20307121 (View on PubMed)

McGee R, Williams S, Kypri K. College students' readiness to reduce binge drinking: criterion validity of a brief measure. Drug Alcohol Depend. 2010 Jun 1;109(1-3):236-8. doi: 10.1016/j.drugalcdep.2009.12.009. Epub 2010 Jan 27.

Reference Type: BACKGROUND

PMID: 20106607 (View on PubMed)

Roese, N. J., Epstude, K. (2017). The functional theory of counterfactual thinking: New evidence, new challenges, new insights. Advances in Experimental Social Psychology, 56, 1-79.

Reference Type: BACKGROUND

Smallman R, Roese NJ. Counterfactual Thinking Facilitates Behavioral Intentions. J Exp Soc Psychol. 2009 Jul;45(4):845-852. doi: 10.1016/j.jesp.2009.03.002.

Reference Type: BACKGROUND

PMID: 20161221 (View on PubMed)

Tal-Or, N., Boninger, D. S., & Gleicher, F. (2004). On becoming what we might have been: Counterfactual thinking and self-efficacy. Self and Identity, 3(1), 5-26.

Reference Type: BACKGROUND

Wong, E. M. (2007). Narrating near-histories: The effects of counterfactual communication on motivation and performance. Management & Organizational History, 2(4), 351-370. https://doi.org/10.1177/1744935907086119

Reference Type: BACKGROUND

Provided Documents

Document Type: Study Protocol

View Document

Document Type: Statistical Analysis Plan

View Document

Document Type: Informed Consent Form: Consent for Baseline Session

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Document Type: Informed Consent Form: Consent for Follow-Up Sessions

View Document

Other Identifiers

IRB20201070D

Identifier Type: -

Identifier Source: org_study_id