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Article Excerpt
THE PRESENT RESEARCH INVESTIGATES how alcohol and group processes combine to affect people's engagement in risk when alone or in groups. Research on the effects of alcohol focuses largely on individuals. As a result of drinking alcohol, individuals are more likely to take risks (McMillen and Wells-Parker, 1987), be sexually irresponsible (Stall et al., 1986), be aggressive (Pernanen, 1991) and emotional (Hull, 1981; Stritzke et al., 1996), and drive dangerously (Guppy, 1994). Alcohol consumption is particularly high among younger people (Office for National Statistics, 2000), most often as part of a social activity (Aitkin, 1985; Morojele and Stephenson, 1994). Damaging effects of alcohol are well documented. Research in Sweden, for example, shows that between 28% and 44% of unnatural deaths may be associated with alcohol, with more than twice as many men affected as women (Sjogren et al., 2000).
In the current research, we consider how group processes combine with alcohol consumption to affect risk attraction among young people. Drinking within groups is a ubiquitous part of our modern social setting. It is not uncommon for people to make decisions as part of a group while consuming alcohol (e.g., in business meetings, at conferences, etc.). Surprisingly little research has been conducted into this phenomenon; thus, this area would benefit from systematic examination. Pharmacological and social psychological processes both may affect risky behavior. High levels of alcohol intake will impair judgmental accuracy and consistency (Mongrain and Standing, 1989). In addition, very strong social pressure can cause sober people to ignore or misperceive critical information (Abrams and Hogg, 1990). The more typical situation, however, may involve moderate alcohol intake and informal social pressure (e.g., drinking during social leisure time or with a work-associate over lunch). With moderate alcohol intake, pharmacological and social processes are likely to combine or interact to affect behavior, rather than one set of processes dominating.
Different countries define the "safe" limit of alcohol intake for driving differently. In the United Kingdom and the United States, the current limit is generally 80 milligrams alcohol per 100 milliliters blood (0.35 mg/1 breath), whereas in most mainland European countries the level is lower, at 50 mg alcohol per 100 ml blood. Given that the limit may represent a socially acceptable threshold for drinking, we were interested in how this level of intake affects judgments made by groups.
According to Steele and Josephs's (1990) "alcohol myopia" model, alcohol makes social behavior more extreme, because it blocks response conflicts by reducing cognitive constraints on affective preferences. The same process can also inflate self-evaluations. Alcohol myopia combines with distracting activity to reduce anxiety and depression by diverting attention from the thoughts and feelings underlying negative states. Fromme et al. (1997) argued that following alcohol consumption, relatively automatic expectation of a positive outcome tends to persist, whereas the systematic processing required to evaluate potential negative outcomes declines. As a result, people become riskier in their choices. Although alcohol may increase positive expectancies because of its pharmacological effects, even the belief that one has consumed alcohol may be sufficient to inhibit systematic processing of potentially negative outcomes (Stacy, 1995). Thus, people may become riskier, simply because they think they are drinking alcohol (an alcohol expectancy effect).
Fromme et al. (1997) compared the effects of alcohol and a placebo in an experiment examining outcome expectancies in various risky scenarios. The intoxicated (but not the placebo) participants underestimated the likelihood of negative consequences from risky situations; this result is consistent with other evidence that alcohol inhibits systematic cognitive processing (Steele and Josephs, 1990). Alcohol did not affect expectancies of positive outcomes. Fromme et al. (1997) did not measure alcohol expectancies directly, however, and therefore it remains unclear whether the levels of expectancy differed between those conditions. Fillmore and Blackburn (2002) observed that participants with higher alcohol expectancy tried to compensate for their supposed intake of alcohol (e.g., by speeding their reaction times on a reaction time task); however, this was accompanied by decreased inhibition.
How might alcohol and group versus individual decision making combine to affect risk attraction? To investigate this question, the present experiment asked participants who were alone or in four-person groups to indicate their attraction to risk, after they had consumed either a placebo or alcohol. We measured participants' attraction to risk over a series of decisions, as well as the time they took to make decisions. There are at least three mechanisms within groups that might moderate the effects of alcohol on the attractiveness of risk (Abrams et al., 1997). These are (1) group polarization/extremity shift, (2) deindividuation, and (3) group monitoring. Each mechanism might have a distinct profile of effects on the measures of risk attraction and decision time. The following predictions were formulated based on previous theory in social psychology. We recognize that these predictions may be contingent on various factors that were not directly manipulated in the present research, but they provide a useful framework for considering how alcohol and group process effects may combine.
Group polarization
Consensus formation causes groups to arrive at more extreme conclusions than the average initial tendency of their individual members (Kerr et al., 1975; Moscovici and Zavalloni, 1969; Zuber et al., 1992). Steele and Josephs's (1990) alcohol myopia model and Fromme et al.'s (1997) research suggest that individuals who have consumed alcohol will become more attracted to risk than those who have not. They will consider a more restricted (and positive) range of possible outcomes when making their decisions about risk, and, therefore, their initial tendency will be shifting toward risk. Assuming that risk has a more positive value when people have been drinking alcohol and a lower value when they have not (see also Sayette et al., 2004), we may expect an interaction effect involving an effect of alcohol that is larger for groups. Risk attraction among groups of drinkers could be expected to be more extreme than among individual drinkers (i.e., group membership would push to the extreme the individual's tendency to become riskier).
It is also conceivable that risk attraction could be reduced (i.e., consolidating an initial tendency to caution) in a sober group relative to sober individuals. We recognize that a relevant issue here is the initial tendency. Our predictions are based on the presumption that initial tendencies are relatively conservative. Regardless of this presumption, the polarization prediction is that any effect of alcohol versus placebo on individuals should be magnified in groups, implying a significant interaction effect.
How might group polarization affect decision time? We are not aware...
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