The project will collect data on amounts and contexts of drinking and of purchasing alcohol in Western Australia, based on a sample of 500 adults with heavier drinkers (5+ drinks on an occasion at least once a month) probabilistically overrepresented, allowing both for a focus on heavier drinking and for an analysis on a sample representative of the population. The report will also cover negative consequences of drinking, attitudes to alcohol policies, and the salience of price to purchasing decisions. Amounts and patterns of drinking and of purchasing will be analysed in terms of demographics, and will be related to experience of adverse consequences of drinking. The report will be oriented to issues that are relevant to policy decisions on liquor licensing and other alcohol policies, and will include comparisons to results from samples in New South Wales (N=637) and Victoria (N=515) The report will be submitted in 2016.
At a minimum, in the case that only a Western Australian sample is collected as part of this study, the report will be based on a new sample of 500 Western Australians, compared to respondents from NSW and Victoria who completed the same survey as part of an Australian National Preventive Health Association funded project.
It is hoped that funding from this grant can be used to gain further funding for a national IAC study as part of an NHMRC partnership grant. If funding is received from NHMRC, a part of the Western Australian sample will be composed of re-interview with those already interviewed there under the existing ANPHA grant, augmented with a sample of 285 new cases to bring the WA sample to 500. As many possible of this total WA group will be re-interviewed on year later. In this option, in addition to the report noted above, an analysis will be conducted of changes in alcohol consumption and purchasing over the year in the total WA sample, in comparison with changes in the re-interviewed NSW and Victorian samples, with attention to the potential impact of changes in liquor licensing or other policy provisions or implementation.