Abstract

Purpose: Several theoretical frameworks postulate that perceptions about social normative information could modify personal attitudes and behavior. The current experiment applied priming methodology to activate the mental representations of peer injunctive norms (perceptions about the attitudinal approval of friends) and peer descriptive norms (perceptions about the behaviors of friends) for alcohol on personal alcohol attitudes, behaviors, and motivations.

Materials and methods: Participants (N = 470) enrolled at a university in the United States were randomly assigned to one of three conditions: peer injunctive norms prime (n = 159), peer descriptive norms prime (n = 153), or control group (n = 158). Participants in the two priming conditions were exposed to a series of item stimuli designed to activate mental concepts about normative alcohol attitudes (peer injunctive norms) or normative alcohol behaviors (peer descriptive norms). The dependent variables were personal drinking attitudes, behaviors, conformity motives, social motives, coping motives, and enhancement motives.

Results: Results indicated that participants primed with the peer injunctive norms or peer descriptive norms manipulations subsequently endorsed statistically higher mean scores on personal alcohol attitudes than the control group. The descriptive norms manipulation resulted in statistically higher endorsement of personal alcohol behaviors and conformity motives than the control group.

Conclusions: These findings suggest that simple and subtle thought accessibility reminders about other people’s alcohol-related attitudes and behaviors might compel social normative effects. The research offers implications about the mechanism of operation for social normative peer pressure on drinking attitudes and behaviors in adolescents and young adults.

摘要

目的：几个理论框架假设对社会规范信息的看法可以改变个人态度和行为。目前的实验应用启动方法来激活对个人饮酒态度、行为和动机的同伴禁令规范（对朋友态度认可的看法）和同伴描述规范（对朋友行为的看法）的心理表征。

材料和方法： 在美国一所大学就读的参与者（N = 470）被随机分配到以下三个条件之一：同伴禁令规范素数（n  = 159）、同伴描述性规范素数（n  = 153）或对照组( n  = 158)。两种启动条件下的参与者暴露于一系列旨在激活关于规范酒精态度（同伴禁令规范）或规范酒精行为（同伴描述规范）的心理概念的项目刺激。因变量是个人饮酒态度、行为、从众动机、社会动机、应对动机和增强动机。

结果：结果表明，与对照组相比，接受同伴禁令规范或同伴描述性规范操作的参与者随后在个人酒精态度上获得了更高的统计平均分数。与对照组相比，描述性规范操纵导致对个人酒精行为和从众动机的统计上更高的认可。

结论：这些发现表明，关于其他人与酒精相关的态度和行为的简单而微妙的思想可及性提醒可能会产生社会规范效应。该研究提供了关于社会规范同伴压力对青少年和年轻人饮酒态度和行为的运作机制的影响。