Peer Effects and Alcohol Use Among College Students

Michael Kremer and Dan M. Levy

No 9876, NBER Working Papers from National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc

Abstract: This paper examines a natural experiment in which students at a large state university were randomly assigned roommates through a lottery system. We find that on average, males assigned to roommates who reported drinking in the year prior to entering college had one quarter-point lower GPA than those assigned to non-drinking roommates. The 10th percentile of their college GPA is half a point lower than among males assigned non-drinking roommates. For males who themselves drank frequently prior to college, assignment to a roommate who drank frequently prior to college reduces GPA by two-thirds of a point. Since students who drink frequently are particularly influenced by frequent-drinking roommates, substance-free housing programs could potentially lower average GPA by segregating drinkers. The effect of initial assignment to a drinking roommate persists and possibly even grows over time. In contrast, students' college GPA is not influenced by roommates' high school grades, admission test scores, or family background. Females' GPAs are not affected by roommates' drinking prior to college. Overall, these findings are more consistent with models in which peers change preferences than models in which they change endowments.

JEL-codes: I12 I20 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2003-07
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-edu, nep-hea and nep-lab
Note: ED CH
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (51)

Published as Kremer, Michael and Dan Levy. "Peer Effects and Alcohol Use Among College Students." Journal of Economic Perspectives 22, 3 (Summer 2008): 189-206.

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.nber.org/papers/w9876.pdf (application/pdf)

Related works:
Journal Article: Peer Effects and Alcohol Use among College Students (2008)
Working Paper: Peer effects and alcohol use among college students (2003)
Working Paper: Peer Effects and Alcohol Use Among College Students
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:nbr:nberwo:9876

Ordering information: This working paper can be ordered from
http://www.nber.org/papers/w9876

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in NBER Working Papers from National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc National Bureau of Economic Research, 1050 Massachusetts Avenue Cambridge, MA 02138, U.S.A.. Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by ().