Alcohol Literacy Challenge

Alcohol Literacy Challenge (ALC) is a brief classroom-based program designed to alter alcohol expectancies and reduce the quantity and frequency of alcohol use among high school and college students. Alcohol expectancies are an individual's beliefs about the anticipated effects of alcohol use, including those that are positive (e.g., increased sociability, reduced tension) and negative (e.g., impairments to mental and behavioral functioning, increased aggressiveness or risk taking). Some of the most desired effects--the arousing, positive, and prosocial effects--are placebo effects rather than pharmacological ones. ALC aims to correct erroneous beliefs about the effects of alcohol, decreasing positive and increasing negative expectancies. These shifts in expectancies have been shown to predict lower levels of alcohol use.