1. Using social practice theory to measure British drinking culture
John Holmes Abdallah Ally, Melanie Lovatt, Alan Brennan, Petra Meier
Sheffield Alcohol Research Group,
ScHARR, University of Sheffield
Funder: Alcohol Research UK

2. What can alcohol consumption data tell us?
How much drinking takes place at mealtimes?
Who pre-loads, when did it start and how has it changed over time?
To what extent has youth drinking shifts from bars to the home?
What proportion of alcohol is sold to the intoxicated?
What proportion of people are binge drinkers?
How does Scotland’s drinking culture differ from England’s?

3. What can alcohol consumption data tell us?
How much How often
Where When Why How Who with

4. We can’t distinguish between…

5. Characterising drinking cultures

6. Dimensional characterisation of drinking cultures
Regular
Mediterranean
Moderate
Intoxication
Scandinavia
Irregular

7. A social practice approach to drinking cultures
Social practices: A routinised type of behaviour consisting of several interconnected elements and irreducible to any single element.
WEEKDAYS
MID-EVENING
AT HOME
WINE
RELAXATION
FREEDOM FROM RESPONSIBILITY
AN HOUR OR TWO

8. Aims of our research
To develop a detailed statistical characterisation of British drinking culture informed by social practice theory
To build a typological model of British drinking occasions,

9. Methods

10. Data Market research data:
One-week alcohol consumption diaries (cross-sectional)
Collection from 1st Jan 2009 to 31st Dec 2011
90,000 respondents (30,000 per year)
60,609 drunk in diary week

11. Occasion characteristics
Variables in the dataset
Occasion characteristics
Day, time and duration
Who with (sex, relationship)
Location (type and urbanity)
Motivation and Purpose
Quantity consumed
Type of drink
Gender
Age
Social grade
Give examples where the information is ambiguous

12. Analysis
A drinking occasion: a period of drinking with no more than two hours between drinks
Sample contained 187,878 occasions
Typology of occasions derived using latent class analysis

13. Latent class analysis A A B B X C C D D

14. Results

15. Headline results for 8-class typology of occasions
Mixed location heavy drinking
Heavy drinking at home with a partner
Get togethers at someone’s house
Going out with friends
10% of occasions
Mean: 14 units
9% of occasions
Mean: 12 units
14% of occasions
Mean: 9 units
11% of occasions
Going out for a meal
Drinking at home alone
Light drinking at home with a partner
Light drinking at home with family
Mean: 5 units
20% of occasions
Mean: 3 units
13% of occasions
Emphasise:
Banality of much of these – there’s nothing that looks like a heavy night out (although talk later about looking specifically at young people) – maybe there is simply too much variation in occasions that this ten-type model can’t capture some of the more spectacular but less frequent events.
The off-trade focus (purple)
Distinguishing feature of many occasions (in this early look at the results) seems to be more the when and why rather than the who, where or how much.

16. All drinking is not equal
Epidemiology:
Different occasions, different risks
Policy:
Different occasions, different effects
Politics:
Which bits of the drinking culture do you want to change?
What would an unproblematic drinking culture look like?

17. Further information Thankyou Email: john.holmes@sheffield.ac.uk
Website: Google: Sheffield Alcohol Research Group