Alcohol's harm to others: Multinational cultural contexts and policy implications

May 2018
Staff: 

NDRI
Dr Anne-Marie Laslett

Other investigators: 

Dr Thomas K Greenfield, Public Health Institute, USA (Principal Investigator)
Dr Jason Bond, Public Health Institute, USA
Dr Katherine Karriker-Jaffe, Public Health Institute, USA
Dr Sarah Roberts, University of California, USA
Dr Thaksaphon Thamarangsi, Ministry of Public Health, Thailand
Professor Isidore Obot, University of Uyo, Nigeria
Professor Vivek Benegal, National Institute of Mental Health and Neurosciences, India
Dr Florence Kerr-Correa, UNESP Brazil
Dr Priscilla Martinez, University of Oslo, Norway
Dr Sharon Wilsnack, University of North Dakota, USA
Professor Kim Bloomfield, Aarhus University, Denmark
Professor Kathryn Graham, Centre for Addiction and Mental Health, Canada
Dr Sandra Kuntsche, Addiction Switzerland Research Institute, Switzerland
Professor Robin Room, Centre for Alcohol Policy Research, La Trobe University
Dr Richard Wilsnack, University of North Dakota, USA
Dr Arlinda Kristjanson, University of North Dakota, USA
Dr Perry W Benson, University of North Dakota, USA

Project description: 

This US National Institutes of Health-funded project will be the first to assess the types, severity, and individual and contextual correlates of harms from others’ heavy drinking in a wide range of societies with greatly varying drinking cultures and policies. Studying alcohol’s harms to others in a multinational, public health framework parallels the role that data on second-hand smoking harms played in making the case for tobacco regulations. The study will apply new metrics, including reduced quality of life and other costs, to document the severity of second-hand impacts of alcohol. By studying comprehensively how individual, social, and economic influences, as well as national alcohol policies, may affect heavy drinkers’ harms to families, friends, and strangers, the research will inform prevention planning and generate data to help gauge alcohol policy effects on these harms in varying cultural contexts.