Developing evidence-based brief interventions to prevent alcohol use problems in young people.

Abstract: Negative affective states such as anxiety and depression are commonly associated with alcohol related problems. Intervention studies have sought to build resilience to negative affective drinking triggers. In our lab, we have conducted a mindfulness intervention (attention directed to the breath) in student drinkers and found that this brief breath counting technique attenuated emotional reactivity to the noise stress and accelerated recovery from noise stress induced alcohol-seeking. Building on this, we then developed a brief coping skill training package that was tailored to target the specific, self-identified negative emotional drinking triggers in high-risk student drinkers (those who drink to cope with negative emotions). The training package also included risk feedback on developing alcohol dependence and guided imagery training for emotion regulation. Findings provided preliminary evidence for the potential of this brief intervention in increasing use of protective behaviour strategies and abstinence self-efficacy, and reducing drinking motives. Future directions will be discussed.