Research That Matters (January 17 - 20, 2008)

Purpose: High-risk drug and alcohol use is an ongoing problem on college campuses. Social workers, often called upon to intervene with heavy-drinking college students, are trained in the social work perspective that focuses on the whole person in environment, emphasizing biological, psychological and social dimensions. Because social workers are expected to use best practice guidelines resulting from empirical evidence, and because religiosity is under researched but important to so many people, social work must take a leadership role in examining the usefulness of religion when addressing high-risk drug and alcohol use among college students. The purpose of this study was to develop and validate the Religion Alcohol and Drug (RAD) Questionnaire for college students to begin to fill this gap in empirical and practice knowledge.

Methods: Data were collected from a convenience sample of 418 undergraduate students, ages 18 to 25, attending a large public university in the southeastern United States. The questionnaire included an author-constructed Influence of Religion scale and employed a modified version of the Alcohol Use Disorders and Identification Test (AUDIT). After screening, 408 questionnaires were examined using Exploratory Factor Analysis.

Findings: Sixty-five percent of the respondents were females, with the majority of students (62%) under the age of 21, and 88% reported having a religious affiliation. Among the participants, 67% were Caucasian, 15% African-American and 12% Hispanic; 19% were First Year Students, 27% Sophomores, 23% Juniors, and 32% Seniors. Initial principal components analysis revealed a 28-item Influence of Religion scale with three likely factors. A principal axis factor analysis using an orthogonal rotation resulted in three conceptually consistent factors that explained 77% of the variance -- Benefit Beliefs (n=10), Harm Deterrent Beliefs (n=9) and Belief Behaviors (n=9). Face/content validity was confirmed through examination of substantive experts. The scale was not related to age, student grades, or where they lived, providing preliminary evidence of discriminant validity. Convergent validity was demonstrated through comparison analysis with an analogous spirituality scale. The findings included the summary score's inverse relationship to heavy drinking, providing evidence of predictive validity.

Implications: High-risk drinking is epidemic on college campuses, and preliminary evidence suggests that religious beliefs and religious behavior beliefs act as protective factors. Including religious beliefs and behaviors in interventions for this population might prove particularly useful. The RAD questionnaire, developed and validated in this study, may well be an essential tool in future studies of these important relationships.