Table 1 Description of theory mention, application, and use by interventions which included an overarching theory

21 Web Basics [United States]

Neighbors C, 2012

Theory of Planned Behavior

✓

✓

✓

Personalized normative feedback regarding participants’ intended quantity and frequency of alcohol consumption use at 21st birthday. Provides education on alcohol (e.g., the relationship between alcohol consumption and blood alcohol concentration). Asks partcipants to consider alternatives to drinking.

• Drinking intention

• Intention to use protective behaviors (e.g., limiting the number of drinks, avoiding drinking games)

Neighbors C, 2009

Alcohol 101 [United States]

Barnett NP, 2004

Social Cognitive Theory

✓

✓

✓

Personalized normative feedback about participants’ drinking patterns and perceptions of peer drinking. Includes elements of motivational interviewing (including information intended to enhance risk perception). Informational content, and harm reduction suggestions.

• Attitudes towards alcohol

• Motivation to change drinking, assessed with “Readiness Ladder”

• Normative and self-ideal discrepancy

Barnett NP, 2007

Carey KB, 2009

Theory of Reasoned Action Transtheoretical model

Carey KB, 2010

Carey KB, 2011

Donahue B, 2004

Lao-Barraco C, 2008

Mastroleo NR, 2011

Murphy JG, 2010

Reis J, 2000

Sharmer L, 2001

AlcoholEdu [United States]

Croom K, 2009

Expectancy theory

✓

✓

✓

Presents “ideas of self-efficacy as related to safe and responsible drinking.” Challenges postive expectancies related to the effects of alcohol use on behavior, mood and cognition. Media literacy and knowledge of adverse effects of drinking is linked to social norms theory. A segment of normative feedback built on motivational interviewing techiniques.

• Expectancies of alcohol use: positive and negative

• Perceived drinking norms

Hustad JTP, 2010

Lovecchio CP, 2010

Social Cognitive Theory

Paschall MJ, 2011

Paschall MJ,, 2011

Social norms theory

Paschall MJ, 2014

Wyatt TM, 2013

Nygaard P, 2012

Wall AF, 2006

Wall AF, 20071

Climate Schools: Alcohol Module/Alcohol and The CLIMATE Schools Combined [Australia]

Newton NC, 2009

Social Influence Approach, derived from social learning theory

✓

✓

✓

Discussion of alcohol and drug refusal skills alcohol use norms among 14–15-year-olds, decision-making about whether to consume alcohol and the purpose of getting drunk discussed, differing views on the consumption of alcohol.

• Alcohol knowledge

• Alcohol expectancies

Newton NC, 2009

Newton NC, 2010

Newton NC, 2011

Newton NC, 2012

Teeson MN, 2014

Vogl L, 2009

College Alc [United States]

Bersamin M, 2007

Problem Behavior Theory

✓

✓

✓

Personalized feedback on how users’ drinking and attitudes towards drinking compare to their peers’. Posting of written assignments and journal entries on a public bulletin board encouraged. Passages about social norms designed to help students clarify their attitudes toward alcohol use and gain a better understanding of peer attitudes. Users encouraged to consider the expectancies they hold regarding alcohol use and how those expectancies influence their behavior.

• Alcohol expectancies (positive and negative)

• Alcohol-related knowledge

• Alcohol-related attitudes

• Intentions to minimize alcohol-related harm

• Normative alcohol beliefs

Paschal MJ, 2006

Theory of Planned Behavior

Check Your Drinking [Canada]

Cunningham JA, 2012

Social Norms Theory

✓

✓

✓

Personalized normative feed back (comparing the participants’ drinking to others of a similar age, sex, and country of origin in the general population or [in the university edition] college student population. Assessment of the severity of the participants’ drinking concerns.

• Perceptions of peer drinking

Doumas DM, 2008

Doumas DM, 2009

eCHECKUP TO GO (eCHUG) [United States]

Alfonso J, 2013

Expectancy theory

✓

✓

✓

Personalized normative feedback assesses the user’s alcohol use and expectations of alcohol use and provides feedback comparing user’s use to typical college students’ use the extent of the negative consequences the student attributes to her or his alcohol use. Motivational interviewing/ motivational enhancement principles mentioned, application unclear.

• Readiness to change

• Motivation to change

• Positive alcohol expectancies

• Positive beliefs about alcohol use

Doumas DM, 2009

Doumas DM, 2014

Social norms theory

Murphy JG, 2010

Walters ST, 2007

Walters ST, 2009

Wodarski JS, 2012

Lifeskills Training CD-ROM [United States]

Williams C, 2005

Social Learning Theory

✓

✓

✓

The basis of this CBI, the LifeSkills Training program, [60] was developed based on Social Learning Theory. The intervention teaches social, self-management and drug resistance skills. Sessions on building self-esteem; goal setting; decision making; myths and misconceptions about tobacco, alcohol, and marijuana; literacy; anxiety management; communication and social skills; and assertiveness training.

• Life-skills knowledge (e.g., communication skills, assertiveness, refusal skills)

• Peer and adult normative expectations regarding smoking, drinking, and drug use

• Pro-drug attitudes

Problem Behavior Theory

Self-derogation Theory

Peer cluster theories

Michigan Prevention and Alcohol Safety for Students (M-PASS) [United States]

Barretto AI, 2011

Health Belief Model

✓

✓

✓

Information that relates alcohol consequences to users’ personal values provided. Personalized feedback provided based on a self-efficacy survey and users’ perceptions of alcohol norms. Section on alcohol use myths and facts corrects confusions and reinforces accurate information. Students make choices based on scenarios where they may be tempted or presurred to drink. Users select benefits of and barriers to drinking less or not drinking at all and are presented with a benefits/barriers scorecard. Users set alcohol- or value-related goals and strategies to reach goals, and learn to monitor progress.

• Tolerance of drinking and drive/drinking

• Reasons to drink

• Use of strategies to avoid high-risk drinking

• Motivations for drinking and not drinking alcohol.

Stages of change:

• For high-risk drinkers, the 12-item Readiness to Change Questionnaire

• For low-risk drinkers, a single-item about anticipated alcohol use in 6 months

Bingham C, 2010

Bingham C, 2011

Theory of Planned Behavior

Transtheoretical Model

Precaution Adoption Process Model

PAS (Prevention of alcohol use in students) [Netherlands]

Koning IM, 2009

Theory of planned behavior

✓

✓

✓

Targets the students’ abilities to develop a healthy attitude towards alcohol use, and build refusal skills.

• Adolescents’ self-control

• Attitudes towards drinking and parental rules

Koning IM, 2010

Social cognitive theory

Project Fitness [United States]

Moore MJ, 2012

Behavior-Image Model (which is supported by Prospect Theory)

✓

✓

✓

Messages on the benefits of health behaviors illustrate how health-promoting behaviors promote salient other and self-images, and messages imparting used to show how health risk behaviors interfere with image outcomes and achievement of health promoting habits.

• Alcohol intentions

• Alcohol prototype image [perceived similarity to those who drink]

• Willingness to be seen as someone who drinks a lot

• Behavior coupling [whether alcohol is perceived to interfere with other health behaviors]

• Alcohol social norms

Reach Out Central [Australia]

Burns J, 2007

Social cognitive theory

✓

✓

Players navigate a virtual, realistic environment designed to be engaging and appealing to the audience, meet other characters and engage in a variety of social situations. Scenarios allow players to make choices and see the consequence of their choices. To help youth recognize and learn strategies to improve their mood, the player’s in-game mood is affected by activities and how he or she responds to other characters and situations.

[No specific outcomes pertaining to theories]

Burns J, 2010

Shandley K, 2010

Elaboration likelihood model

RealTeen [United States and Canada]

Schwinn TM, 2010[b]

Social Learning Theory

✓

✓

✓

Lessons on nine topics: goal setting, decision making, coping, self-esteem, assertion, communication, media influences, peer pressure, and drug facts. Players respond to a question related to each topic, and can post their response to a personal diary, a public blog, or a peer “pen-pal.”

• Self-efficacy to make decisions, set goals, refuse drugs, and manage social situations and stress

• Perception of the acceptability of using alcohol • Perceptions of alcohol use norms among peers

What Do You Drink [Netherlands]

Voogt CV, 2011

I-change Model (integration of several approaches including Fishbein-Ajzen’s Theory of Reasoned Action, Transtheoretical Model, and Social Learning Theory)

✓

✓

✓

A personalized normative feedback segment, includes screening and feedback tailored to alcohol intake, sex and perceived social norms, including advice about drinking according to national health guidelines, estimates of the the number of standard drinks and calories consumed, and the cost of those drinks in weight gained and money spent. Another segment asks participants to make decisions about how much alcohol they want to drink, provides them with tips for how to resist alcohol in different situations, shows vignettes related to alcohol use, and asks them to determine factors in the scenes that make it hard to resist drinking. Goal setting and action planning elements related to motivational interviewing.

• Positive or negative attitudes towards alcohol use

• Self-efficacy

• Subjective norms

• Alcohol expectancies

Voogt CV, 2012

Voogt CV, 2013

Voogt CV, 2014

Voogt CV, 2014

Social Influence/Social Cognitive Theory

Your Decisions Count– Alcohol, Tobacco and Other Drugs [United States]

Evers KE, 2012

Transtheoretical model

✓

✓

✓

Feedback given on progress through the stages of change. Advice is given on what behavioral strategies players could employ to continue progressing. Short movies of students giving testimonials about drug use.

• Pros and cons of being drug-free (decisional balance)

• Processes of change

• Processes of resistance

• Self-efficacy

• Stage of change (for each substance being targeted)

No name [Asian-American Mother Daughter Intervention] [United States]

Fang L, 2010

Family interaction theory

✓

✓

✓

Extensive exercises to cultivate trust and communication between mother and daughter: a conflict management role play; animations showing how engaging in or avoiding substance use respectively hurts or benefits adolescent girls; body image and mood management exercises; sress management exercises with animated characters illustrating signs of stress; problem solving using the Stop, Options, Decide, Act, and Self-praise metthod; and exercises correcting misperceptions of peer use of substance with graphs and other visuals; and an interactive game emphasizing the importance of praise and assertiveness.

• Level of mother daughter closeness

• Maternal monitoring

• Mother-daughter communication

Fang L, 2012

Fang L, 2013

Fang L, 2014

No name [Black and hispanic mother-daughter intervention] [United States]

Schinke S, 2011

Family interaction theory

✓

✓

✓

Activities to improve mother-daughter communication, increase parental monitoring and rule enforcement, build daughters’ self-image and self-esteem, create family rituals, and avoid unrealistic expectations on the part of mothers. Exercises to increase the value of time together and to increase family rituals and routines. Lessons designed to enhance self-efficacy were incorporated into the program (with no explanation of how self-efficacy was enhanced).

• Mother-daughter communication

• Perceptions of family rules against substance use

• Perceptions of parental monitoring of extracurricular activities, whereabouts, and friends

• Normative beliefs about peer substance use

• Self-efficacy to avoid alcohol, tobacco, and drug use

• Daughters’ intentions to smoke, drink, and use drugs as adults

Social Learning Theory

Attachment Theory

Deviant behavior proneness theory

No name [College freshman intervention] [United States]

Lewis MA, 2007a

Social Comparison Theory

✓

✓

✓

Personalized normative feedback providing information regarding personal drinking, perceptions of typical student drinking, and actual typical student drinking norms. Two versions were created: one offering gender-specific feedback and the other offering gender-neutral feedback.

• Revised version of the Collective Self-Esteem Scale, a measure of gender identity

For peers in general and same-gender peers, perceptions of:

• Typical weekly drinking

• Typical number of drinks consumed per drinking occasion

• Typical drinking occasions per week

Lewis MA, 2007b

Social Impact Theory

Social Identity Theory

No name [E-newsletter intervention] [United States]

Moore MJ, 2005

Extended Parallel Process Model (based on Social Cognitive Theory and the Health Belief Model)

✓

✓

✓

E-mail newsletter includes a question challenging an alcohol-expectancy belief and refuting that expectancy; presented a “realistic” strategy for reducing the risk of binge drinking

• The questionnaire covered “constructs from prominent psychosocial theories associated with alcohol consumption and underpinning the EPPM, including Social Cognitive Theory and Health Belief Model”; results not published for these measures

No name [Laptop ER intervention] [United States]

Gregor MA, 2003

Social Learning Theory

✓

✓

Intervention based on the Alcohol Misuse Prevention Study curriculum, which in turn was based in Social Learning theory. Content designed to increase knowledge about alcohol, increase refusal skills, and decrease intentions to misuse alcohol. Refusal skills taught by having the participant refuse an offer of beer and then receiving feedback about his or her choice

[No specific outcomes pertaining to theories]

Maio RF, 2005

No name [Web-based Substance Use Prevention for Adolescent Girls] [United States]

Schinke S, 2009

Family interaction theory

✓

✓

✓

Exercises designed to build rapport, positive communication and respect between parent and child; emphasizing value of listening to each other, spending time together, understanding one another’s personality, negotiating mutually agreeable resolutions to problems, and giving gifts of time, compliments, and personal favors. Includes modules aimed at refusal skills, self-esteem, goal-setting, racism, assertiveness, peer norms around underage drinking, and conflict and stress management.

• Mother-daughter communication skills

• Parental monitoring and rule setting

• Drug-refusal self-efficacy.

• Normative beliefs assessed with relevant items from the American Drug and Alcohol Survey

• Measures of depression, problem solving skills and body esteem.

Schinke S, 2009

Schinke S, 2009