College: Where Your Friends Are Your Parents?!

College season is here! It’s time to get out of your parent’s basement and head to paradise where you are your own boss. And as your own boss, you’re up for an adventure involving lots of alcohol and lost of sex, right?! Well, not so fast. In college, where there are no parents or other boring adults to supervise you, your friends take that role according to a new study from Arizona State University.

Arizona State University researchers Lisa Menegatos and Linda C. Lederman analyzed participating student’s immediate responses (using electronic clicker technology) to scenarios involving alcohol-related decisions. The students selected what they would do if they were at a party and their drunk friend “Jane” was invited to go home with a guy she just met.

Three quarters of the study’s participants reported they would do whatever it takes to make sure their drunk female friend is safe. Menegatos and Lederman found student participants would use the following techniques to make sure their friend would get home safely:

• Highlight the regret associated with that behavior. Participants said they would remind their friends about the negative health and social consequences associated with going home with someone. These include getting pregnant, developing a bad reputation, and regretting their decision in the morning.

• Use trickery or deception. Students hold the belief that drunken friends can be easily distracted or exploited. To remove their friends from a risky situation, the participants said they would trick their friends by taking them to get food, or putting them into a cab to go home, instead of going to the male acquaintance’s place.

• Direct confrontation. To protect their friends from dangerous situations, the study participants said they would directly confront their friends. This includes specifically telling their friends that they need to leave, or physically removing them from the situation.

“Our study suggests friends often try to protect friends. The interpersonal and persuasive skills they use to do this include many of the same skills they learn in their communication courses,” Menegatos explains. In addition to teaching new college students about alcohol and how bad it is during the new student orientation, colleges should focus on helping students develop their communication and persuasion skills to more effectively help their friends during a party or similar situation.

It is refreshing to know that in college, when students do choose to engage in risky behaviors, they are simultaneously watching out for each other. Colleges should be encouraging that type of behavior in college and beyond.

What techniques have you used to help your friends stay safe?

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