The Alcohol Use Disorders Identification Scale (AUDIT) normative scores for a multiracial sample of Rhodes University residence students

Abstract

Objective: The objective of this research is to obtain accurate drinking norms for students living in the university residences in preparation for future social norms interventions that would allow individual students to compare their drinking to an appropriate reference group.

Method: Random cluster sampling was used to obtain data from 318 residence students who completed the Alcohol Use Disorders Identification Test (AUDIT), a brief, reliable and valid screening measure designed by the World Health Organisation (Babor et al. 2001).

Results: The Cronbach alpha coefficient of 0.83 reported for this multicultural sample is high, suggesting that the AUDIT may be reliably used in this and similar contexts. Normative scores are reported in the form of percentiles. Comparisons between the portions of students drinking safely and hazardously according to race and gender indicate that while male students are drinking no more hazardously than female students, white students drink far more hazardously than black students.

Conclusions: These differences suggest that both race- and gender-specific norms would be essential for an effective social norms intervention in this multicultural South African context. Finally, the racialised drinking patterns might reflect an informal segregation of social space at Rhodes University.