ArticleJournal of studies on alcohol and drugs2018
Increasing Chance-Based Uncertainty Reduces Heavy Drinkers' Cognitive Reactance to Web-Based Personalized Normative Feedback.
Article in Journal of studies on alcohol and drugs, 2018. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 8 papers.
What it found
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The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
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Who cites it
8 citing papers in PubMed, 18 citations in OpenAlex.
- Integrating social media inspired features into a personalized normative feedback intervention combats social media-based alcohol influence.Drug and alcohol dependence · 2021Trial
- Leveraging copresence to increase the effectiveness of gamified personalized normative feedback.Addictive behaviors · 2019Trial
- Digital public health interventions for the promotion of mental well-being and health behaviors among university students: a rapid review.BMC public health · 2025Review
- A Causal Analysis of Young Adults' Binge Drinking Reduction and Cessation.European journal of investigation in health, psychology and education · 2023Article
- An examination of the prospective associations between objectively assessed exposure to alcohol-related Instagram content, alcohol-specific cognitions, and first-year college drinking.Addictive behaviors · 2021Article
- A Gamified, Social Media-Inspired, Web-Based Personalized Normative Feedback Alcohol Intervention for Lesbian, Bisexual, and Queer-Identified Women: Protocol for a Hybrid Trial.JMIR research protocols · 2021Article
- Lesbians' use of popular social media sites is associated with perceived drinking norms & interest in receiving personalized normative feedback on alcohol use.Alcoholism treatment quarterly · 2020Article
- In pursuit of a self-sustaining college alcohol intervention: Deploying gamified PNF in the real world.Addictive behaviors · 2018Article
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
4 authors at 1 institution in 1 country.
Funding
Abstract
objectiveDespite its prominence in the health communication literature, psychological reactance has rarely been considered as a factor that may undermine web-based Personalized Normative Feedback (PNF) alcohol interventions for college students. This study built on recent gamification work to examine how chance-based uncertainty, a popular game mechanic associated with motivation and attention in digital games for learning, might be leveraged to reduce the psychological reactance experienced by heavy drinking students receiving alcohol PNF, thereby leading to larger reductions in their alcohol consumption.
methodPsychological reactance, perceptions of norms, and drinking behaviors were assessed during a 3-week period following random assignment of binge drinking students (N = 141, 51% female) into one of four web-based PNF conditions. These conditions asked the same questions about drinking and delivered identical PNF on alcohol use but differed in whether animated slot-machine spinners appeared to select participants' question and feedback topics as well as the number of additional topics (beyond alcohol) on which questions were asked and PNF was delivered.
resultsAll conditions similarly reduced drinking norms but differed in the degree to which they aroused cognitive reactance and reduced drinking. Relative to a no-spinner alcohol-only condition, increasing chance-based uncertainty by giving question and feedback topics the appearance of being selected by gamelike spinners substantially reduced cognitive reactance, which, in turn, reduced drinking 20 days later. Overall, participants experienced the least cognitive reactance when spinners first selected three question topics and later selected two of these topics to deliver feedback on.
conclusionsFindings suggest that introducing chance-based uncertainty through gamelike spinners, asking questions about multiple topics, and delivering feedback on additional topics unrelated to alcohol together work to reduce the degree to which the task feels like an alcohol intervention overtly aimed at reducing consumption, thereby making the alcohol PNF more effective among heavy drinking students.
Indexed as
Identifiers
30079876PMC6090103W2886470325What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.