An Impact Evaluation of Underage Drinking Prevention Projects
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Summary
This report presents an impact evaluation of four community-based underage drinking prevention programs funded by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) and coordinated by the Governors Highway Safety Association. The study aimed to determine if the success of the Washington Regional Alcohol Program could be replicated in other jurisdictions to reduce youth alcohol-related crashes. The four evaluated programs were located in Chesterfield County, Virginia; Omaha, Nebraska; Salt Lake County, Utah; and Travis County, Texas. The evaluation utilized interrupted time series analysis (ARIMA method) on archival crash data to assess the effect of these programs on proxy measures of alcohol-related crashes, specifically nighttime injury crashes involving drivers under age 21. Three of the programs—Safe and Sober Youth (Virginia), Project Extra Mile (Nebraska), and the Travis County Underage Drinking Prevention Program (Texas)—primarily employed public information and education (PI&E) strategies. These initiatives included raising public awareness, coordinating school-based activities, enhancing judicial sentencing, and, in Nebraska’s case, advocating for legislative changes and increasing enforcement of youth alcohol laws. Despite these efforts, the statistical analysis found no significant impact on nighttime injury crashes involving underage drivers in any of these three jurisdictions. The authors note that the small number of crashes in some areas may have limited the statistical power to detect effects, and that positive outcomes such as reduced youth drinking or improved community coordination were not captured by crash data alone. In contrast, the fourth program, the Salt Lake City Underage Drinking Prevention Project (Utah), emphasized enforcement of laws prohibiting alcohol sales to minors, supported by youth peer programs. This program demonstrated a possible impact that increased over time. Approximately one year after initiation, the number of nighttime crashes involving underage drivers in Salt Lake County began to decrease. By three years post-initiation, this reduction amounted to approximately 20 crashes per month, representing a 14% decrease (p=0.10). The findings suggest that public information and education strategies alone are insufficient to reduce alcohol-related crashes among youth in the short term. Instead, initiatives that directly reduce the availability of alcoholic beverages or deter driving after drinking, such as enforcement-focused programs, appear more effective. The report concludes that while PI&E programs may yield other societal benefits, they do not necessarily translate into measurable reductions in traffic crashes without complementary enforcement or availability-reduction components.
Key finding
The Salt Lake County program resulted in a decrease of approximately 20 nighttime crashes per month involving underage drivers after three years, while three other programs relying primarily on public information and education showed no significant impact on crash rates.
Methodology
dataset
Provenance
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| Stage | Outcome | Tool | Model | Prompt | Attempts | Completed |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| discover | success | rosap | — | — | 2 | 2026-05-23 |
| archive | success | — | — | — | 1 | 2026-05-23 |
| extract | success | cached | — | — | 2 | 2026-06-10 |
| clean | success | — | — | — | 1 | 2026-06-01 |
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| embed | success | — | — | — | 1 | 2026-06-02 |
| enrich | success | — | — | — | 1 | 2026-05-23 |
| promote | success | — | — | — | 1 | 2026-05-23 |
| summarize | success | llm | qwen3.6-27b-prismaquant | summ-v5 | 3 | 2026-06-10 |
| tag | success | vector_similarity | — | — | 19 | 2026-06-11 |
| verify | success | — | — | — | 2 | 2026-06-10 |
Summary generated by qwen3.6-27b-prismaquant on 2026-06-10; verification: verified.
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- Applied Guidance: countermeasure evaluation, policy recommendations