(PS6-C64) Education Status as a Moderator of Associations Between Positive Alcohol Expectancies and Drinking Outcomes

Positive alcohol expectancies (i.e., favorable beliefs about the effects of alcohol) are consistently linked with drinking behaviors. Expectancies develop through direct and indirect learning and are influenced by an individual’s environment. Alcohol expectancies may be acquired and maintained through observations of peers experiencing positive effects from alcohol, such as observing a friend become socially disinhibited after drinking. Due to potential differences in environmental exposure to peer drinking for college and noncollege-attending young adults, the development and salience of particular expectancies may vary across these subgroups of drinkers. Though research has separately evaluated expectancies among college students and nonstudents, direct comparisons of these groups could shed light on the broader contextual influences of alcohol beliefs on drinking. Thus, the present study aimed to evaluate (1) differences in positive expectancy subscales (i.e., sociability, tension reduction, liquid courage, and sexuality) by education status (i.e., current/previous enrollment in 4-year university vs. not); and (2) the moderating role of education status on associations between positive expectancy subscales and drinking (i.e., typical quantity, frequency, and binge frequency). Participants were 623 individuals (31.1% female; 29.5% nonstudents; M_age = 21.46, SD = 1.70; 65.6% White) recruited from Craigslist who completed an online survey. For aim 1, MANCOVA results revealed that college students reported stronger expectancies than nonstudents for all subscales when controlling for alcohol use. For aim 2, moderation analyses revealed that education status moderated the positive association between social expectancies and all three outcomes such that social expectancies only predicted drinking behavior among nonstudents. Education status also moderated the positive association between liquid courage expectancies and drinking quantity and frequency for both groups but was stronger for college students. Finally, education status moderated the positive association between tension reduction expectancies and drinking frequency for both groups but was stronger for college students. Overall, our findings suggest that college students have generally stronger positive expectancies than nonstudents when controlling for typical alcohol use, but the strength of the expectancy-drinking associations varies based on education status. Social expectancies may be particularly salient for nonstudent drinkers, perhaps due to nonstudents’ lack of access to the highly social atmosphere of college life; therefore, nonstudents may have learned to expect that alcohol could help facilitate social engagement. For college students, liquid courage and tension reduction expectancies showed a particularly strong association with drinking. These findings support the potential impact of environmental factors, including exposure to the college drinking culture, on alcohol expectancy salience. Future research could evaluate interactional effects between environmental and individual factors (e.g., socioeconomic status) that may aid in explaining differences in expectancy salience by educational status.