Talk about alcohol

Objective

To postpone the onset of alcohol consumption among pupils.

To change the attitude and behaviour towards alcohol among the youth.

To reduce over consumption and motivate to responsible drinking.

To provide tools for teachers and schools to teach, discuss, inform, and create a deeper debate and understanding of alcohol among 13-17 year olds.

Description

The school-based educational programme focuses on teaching pupils how to resist social pressure, peer pressure and learn a way to say "no" to alcohol. The programme is a self-instructive; teachers workbook available both in print and on the web. Teachers order the material and implement it on their own at schools. Help is provided by telephone or e-mail. In addition, every year, five training days are organised for teachers, conducted by professional instructors along with local authorities.

The programme is composed of:

Classroom activities: Divided into 4 educational levels, activities include excercises and role play. They focus on social and life skills aspects; resisting peer pressure and increasing the awareness of responsible drinking.
Family skills programme: How to involve parents in the school-based project and information and advice to help parents discuss the issues with their children at home.
School policy programme: Instructions on how to integrate and motivate the whole school and instructions to support the creation of a long term engagement to a change in attitude towards alcohol.
Short story competition: A short story book containing the best stories is produced each year.
Yearly advertising campaign challenge: The "Tell a hundered - at least" competition encourages students to create a campaign to influence pupils not to consume alcohol and not to drink and drive called. The winning class receives 12,500 euros. Examples of previous campaigns are available as Youtube clips, Facebook pages, blogs, websites, school plays, letters to newspapers, etc and winning entries are and winning entries are posted to the competition blog. The 2015 campaign runs from January to May.
A dedicated website which contains information on the programme and where materials can be downloaded (updated in 2011).

In 2007 the programme was adapted for the national driving schools organisation "STR" (Sveriges Trafikskolors Risksförbund). The main objective was to give driving teachers support in promoting the "Don't Drink and Drive" message.

In 2008 a version for sport clubs was launched called "Teach about Alcohol-sports". It was rolled-out in cooperation with the biggest sport club in Sweden AIK (football). Co-operation continued in 2009. It provides youth leaders with a tool to discuss alcohol, its impact and to promote sport as an "alcohol-free" zone.

Partners

Swedish Transport Administration (advertising competition)

AIK football club

Swedish Marketing Association

Brewers of Sweden

Kunskapskraft & Media

Life-skills related website ungdomar.se

Parents-oriented website nattvandring.nu

Swedish School Curator Association

Results

By December 2022:

Talk About Alcohol is one of the most widespread youth prevention programmes in Sweden today.
Around 75% of the targeted 2,700 schools have ordered (and re-ordered) the programme.
Over 10,000 students have participated in the short story competition.
Around 1,000 students have entered the advertising competition which reached around 600,000 through various means.
Around 1,000 teachers participated in teacher training seminars organised in 2022.
The website has yearly about 48,000 unique visitors.

Measurement & evaluation

A long-term scientific study, covering attitudes and behaviour over three years began in 2014 and will be completed in 2017. Over 1,000 pupils take part (intervention and control group). The scientific study was supervised by scientist at Karolinska Institute. The overal results from the scientific study:

Overall positive effects among the youth who have undergone the school programme, but more positive for boys
The programme does not have a proved effect on the alcohol debut
The programme have clear effects on drunkenness for boys
The programme halving the negative consequences of alcohol consumption for girls
The programme give a trend that boys who underwent the program are less likely to start drinking alcohol

A quantitative web survey is held every year among teachers and other existing users of the programme. Its purpose is to measure the usability and perceived impact amongst participants (800 participants each year). Results from the 2021 web survey:

83 % of respondents believe that the programme influences pupils to delay the age of consumption.
85% of respondents believe that the programme lead to better attitude and motivates to drink responsibly.
89% say they would recommend the programme to colleagues.

A quantitative study was undertaken also in 2010 among ninth graders (15-16 year olds) to examine the extent of which the programme could influence young people. It was carried out in two parts: pre-test in January 2010 and follow up test May/June 2010. 120 students in the intervention group and 120 in the control group took part. A sample of results show that:

There was no difference between the groups regarding delaying the onset of alcohol consumption.
The intervention group showed a shift of greater awareness and a healthier attitude to alcohol use than the control group.
The control group students drank more frequently and were more likely to get drunk to a greater degree than the intervention group.
Over time, control group students had been involved in more adverse reactions/risky behaviours when they drank than the control group (eg. been hungover, not been able to function normally at school).
The increase in consumption and higher frequency of intoxication together with a higher risk behaviour in the control group also signifies a negative "compound interest"-effect, which means that the influence of Talk About Alcohol on the intervention group becomes even more positive.