PREVENTING SALES OF ALCOHOL TO MINORS - RESULTS FROM A COMMUNITY TRIAL

This paper reports an evaluation of a community-based approach to prev ent underage sales of alcohol. The interventions focused on (a) enforc ement of underage sales laws, (b) responsible beverage service (RES) t raining and (c) media advocacy. The interventions were implemented in three experimental communities located in California and South Carolin a. Purchase survey data were obtained before and after the interventio ns in each experimental community and in three matched comparison comm unities. Logistic regression analyses of the purchase survey data far the individual community pairs and for the combined communities showed that sales to apparent miners were significantly reduced in the exper imental sites. The findings indicate that these environmental interven tions are promising prevention tools for communities that seek to redu ce underage drinking.