Collegiate Student-Athletes as Health Advocates: The Role of Issue and Source Involvement in Students’ Information Processing about Binge Drinking

Abstract

Binge drinking is a major public health concern on college campuses and shares a deep connection to sporting culture. As such, student-athletes are potential referent points for addressing this destructive behavior among the student body. This study utilizes the theoretical frameworks of the elaboration likelihood model (ELM) and parasocial relationships (PSRs) to investigate the effects that student-athletes’ health advocacy has on college students’ attitudinal and behavioral intentions to binge drink. Analysis of data collected from 161 college students, who met the clinical definition of binge drinkers, indicated that issue involvement was associated with more favorable attitudes and the intention to continue drinking, and a disregard for student-athlete health advocacy. Greater degrees of source involvement (i.e., PSR), with depicted student-athletes, however, was found to positively affect elaboration and indirectly foster behavioral intentions to cease binge drinking. Results enhance our understanding of the ELM by suggesting source involvement – as opposed to issue involvement – can be an effective means of encouraging elaboration and decreasing college students’ behavioral intentions to binge drink.