Completed Projects

Note: To request publications, please copy the Publication Number(s) of the paper(s) you would like and enter your information in the form at the bottom of the page.

RECENTLY COMPLETED PROJECTS

Examination of Current Minimum Legal Marijuana Use Age 21 Laws in a State Where Recreational Marijuana is Legal: California (subcontract)

Principal Investigator: James Fell, MS
Subcontract Principal Investigator: Traci Toomey, PhD
Co-Investigator: Darin Erickson, PhD
Funding Agency: Insurance Institute for Highway Safety
Goals: The goal of this study was to examine the current minimum legal marijuana use age 21 (MLMU-21) laws in California. This included assessing whether underage people could accessing marijuana from retail establishments, documenting current levels and types of training and enforcement of the California MLMU-21 law, and identifying current rates of use of marijuana among youth using existing data.


Publication:

Pub. No. 233. Fell JC, Toomey T, Eichelberger AH, Kubelka J, Schriemer D, Erickson D. What is the likelihood that underage youth can obtain marijuana from licensed recreational marijuana outlets in California, a state where recreational marijuana is legal? Journal of Safety Research, 82:102-111, 2022.


A Preliminary Assessment of the Emerging Marijuana Retail Environment

Principal Investigator: Darin Erickson, PhD
Funding Agency: University of Minnesota

Goals: This pilot study characterized the cannabis retail environment as it pertains to youth access in the only two states that had legalized cannabis for recreational use at the time of the study, Colorado and Washington. We conducted systematic in-store observations in 50 cannabis stores in each state to examine sales practices and evaluate types of products being sold, particularly those that may appeal to youth (Lenk et al., 2021). We also conducted telephone surveys in the two states of: (1) owners/managers of 50 cannabis retail stores to assess knowledge, policies, practices, and training pertaining to youth access (Lenk et al., 2021), and (2) 50 law enforcement agencies to assess the enforcement of cannabis laws pertaining to youth access and use and impaired driving (Wiens et al., 2018).

Publications: 

Pub. No. 230. Lenk KM, Wiens T, Fabian LEA, Erickson DJ. Practices and policies of marijuana retail stores in the first two US states to legalize recreational marijuana sales. Drugs: Education, Prevention and Policy Prevention, 28(4):340-348, 2021.

Pub. No. 223. Wiens T, Lenk KM, Fabian LEA, Erickson DJ. Law enforcement practices in the first two states in U.S. to legalize recreational marijuana. International Journal of Drug Policy, 61:38-43, 2018.


Development of an Alcohol Risk Management Program for College Fraternities

Principal Investigator: Toben Nelson, ScD
Co-Investigators: Darin Erickson, PhD; Traci Toomey, PhD
Funding Agency: National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism

Goals: The project goals include developing and evaluating a training program for college leaders and administrators to adopt and implement feasible policies and procedures to reduce binge drinking and related risks for college students in the Greek system.


State and Local Alcohol Policies: The Case of Malt Liquor

Principal Investigator: Rhonda Jones-Webb, DrPH
Co-Investigators: Traci Toomey, PhD; Darin Erickson, PhD; Toben Nelson, ScD
Funding Agency:  National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism

Goals: The main goals of this project are: (1) Develop new measures of the restrictiveness of malt liquor policies and other local alcohol policies. (2) Evaluate the effectiveness of malt liquor policies in reducing crime associated with malt liquor consumption in 19 U.S. cities using an interrupted time-series design with control group. (3) Assess whether the effects of malt liquor policies on crime vary by the state alcohol policy environment using panel regression models or pooled time-series.

Publication:

Pub. No. 218. McKee P, Erickson DJ, Toomey T, Nelson T, Less EL, Joshi S, Jones-Webb R. The impact of single-container malt liquor sales restrictions on urban crime. Journal of Urban Health, 94(2):289-300, 2017. 


Evaluation of a Hybrid In-person and Online Alcohol Service Training Program

Principal Investigator: Traci Toomey, PhD
Co-Investigators: Darin Erickson, PhD; Keith Horvath, PhD; Toben Nelson, ScD
Funding Agency: National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism

Goals: The goal of this study is to develop, implement and evaluate an alcohol training program for general managers of bars and restaurants. The training program encourages managers  to adopt and implement alcohol service policies in their establishment with the goal of promoting responsible alcohol service.

Publications:

Pub. No. 211. Page TF, Nederhoff DM, Ecklund AM, Horvath KJ, Nelson TF, Erickson DJ, Toomey TL. A cost analysis of web-enhanced training to reduce alcohol sales to intoxicated bar patrons. Journal of Alcohol and Drug Education. Aug 59(2):25-42, 2015. 

Pub. No. 214. Toomey TL, Lenk KM, Nederhoff DM, Nelson TF, Ecklund AM, Horvath KJ, Erickson DJ. Can obviously intoxicated patrons still easily buy alcohol at on-premise establishments? Alcoholism: Clinical and Experimental Research, 40(3):616-622, 2016. 

Pub. No. 217. Toomey TL, Lenk KM, Erickson DJ, Horvath KJ, Ecklund AM, Nederhoff DM, Hunt SL, Nelson TF. Effects of a hybrid online and in-person-training program designed to reduce alcohol sales to obviously intoxicated patrons. Journal of Studies on Alcohol and Drugs, 78(2):268-275, 2017. 


Assessing How Local-Level Law Enforcement Strategies, Both Specific and in the Aggregate, Influence Binge Drinking and Alcohol-Impaired Driving in Communities Across the U.S.

Principal Investigator: Traci Toomey, PhD
Co-Investigators: Darin Erickson, PhD; Toben Nelson, ScD
Funding Agency: National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism

Goal: The goal of this study was to evaluate how different types of law enforcement strategies are related to heavy alcohol use and drunk driving in communities across the U.S.


Mediators and Moderators of a Neighborhood Experiment on Alcohol Use

Principal Investigator: Theresa Osypuk, SD
Co-Investigators: Toben Nelson, ScD; Maria Glymour, ScD; David Rehkopf, ScD
Funding Agency: National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism

Goals: This project will test mediation and moderation of a social experiment of housing and neighborhood relocation on alcohol use, excessive drinking, and alcohol dependence, among adolescents and their mothers to probe whether, why, and among whom neighborhood context earlier in life is a cause of alcohol use across 15 years. This knowledge will inform the next generation of alcohol prevention policies. Because of its experimental design, results will inform causal pathways and potential intervention points, including during childhood, by which to reduce the population burden of alcohol use.

Publication:

Pub. No. 237. Joshi S, Schmidt NM, Thyden NH, Glymour MM, Nelson TF, Haynes D, Osypuk TL. Do alcohol outlets mediate the effects of the moving to opportunity experiment on adolescent excessive drinking? a secondary analysis of a randomized controlled trial. Substance Use and Misuse, 57(12), 1788-1796, 2022.

Pub. No. 238. Thyden NH, Schmidt NM, Joshi S, Kim H, Nelson TF, Osypuk TL. Housing mobility
protects against alcohol use for children with socioemotional health vulnerabilities: An experimental design. Alcoholism: Clinical and Experimental Research, 46(9), 1695-1709, 2022.

Pub. No. 239. Osypuk TL, Joshi S, Schmidt NM, Glymour MM, Nelson TF. Effects of a federal housing voucher experiment on adolescent binge drinking: a secondary analysis of a randomized controlled trial. Addiction, EarlyView doi:10.1111/add.14379
https://rdcu.be/5XEB


A Comprehensive Analysis of State Alcohol Policy Environment and Its Effects

Principal Investigator: Darin Erickson, PhD
Co-Investigators: Traci Toomey, PhD; Toben Nelson, ScD; Rhonda Jones-Webb, DrPH
Funding Agency: National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism

Goals: This four-year study had four specific aims: (1) Develop a measure of the strength of specific alcohol control policies across states; (2) Measure the state alcohol policy environment using latent variable analyses; (3) Assess level of enforcement of alcohol policies within each state; (4) Assess the relationships between the alcohol policy environment and related consequences including alcohol consumption, traffic crash mortality and several other specific types of injury-related deaths, and assess how enforcement levels influence these relationships.

Publications:

Pub. No. 212. Erickson DJ, Lenk KM, Toomey TL, Nelson TF, Jones-Webb R. The state-level policy environment, enforcement, and alcohol use in the United States. Drug and Alcohol Review. 35:6-12, 2016. 

Pub. No. 213. Erickson D, Rutledge P, Lenk K, Nelson T, Jones-Webb R, Toomey T. Patterns of alcohol policy enforcement activities among local law enforcement agencies: A latent class analysis. International Journal of Alcohol and Drug Research. 4(2):103-111, 2015. PMCID: PMC4749155 

Pub. No. 207. Erickson DJ, Farbakhsh K, Toomey TL, Lenk KM, Jones-Webb R, Nelson TF. Enforcement of alcohol-impaired driving laws in the United States: A national survey of state and local agencies. Traffic Injury Prevention 16:533-539, 2015. 

Pub. No. 202. Erickson DJ, Lenk KM, Toomey TL, Nelson TF, Jones-Webb R, Mosher JF. Measuring the strength of state-level alcohol control policies. World Medical and Health Policy, 6(3):171-186, 2014. 

Pub. No. 208. Jones-Webb R, Toomey TL, Lenk KM, Nelson TF, Erickson DJ. Targeting adults who provide alcohol to underage youth: Results from a national survey of local law enforcement agencies. Journal of Community Health. 40(3):569-575, 2015. 

Pub. No. 199. Lenk KM, Toomey TL, Nelson TF, Jones-Webb R, Erickson DJ. State and local law enforcement agency efforts to prevent sales to obviously intoxicated patrons. Journal of Community Health, 30(2):339-348, 2014. 

Pub. No. 216. Lenk KM, Nelson TF, Toomey TL, Jones-Webb R, Erickson DJ. Sobriety checkpoint and open container laws in U.S.: Associations with reported drinking-driving. Traffic Injury Prevention, 17(8):782-787, 2016. 

Pub. No. 215. Linde AC, Toomey TL, Lenk KM, Wolfson J, Jones-Webb R, Erickson DJ. Associations between responsible beverage service laws and binge drinking and alcohol-impaired driving. Journal of Alcohol and Drug Education. 60(2):35-49, 2016.


Identifying Facilitators and Barriers to Dissemination of Alcohol Screening, Intervention and Treatment on College Campuses

Principal Investigator: Traci L. Toomey, PhD
Collaborator: Ken Winters, PhD
Funding Agency: Academic Health Center, University of Minnesota

Goals: This grant was a first step in creating and ultimately evaluating a training program that will promote dissemination and implementation of evidence-based screening, intervention, and treatment on college campuses. With this grant we conducted in-depth interviews with college leaders from different sized campuses to  assess barriers and facilitators of adoption of screening, brief intervention, and treatment programs on campuses. This information will inform future development of the training program.


Spatial and Temporal Effects of Alcohol Compliance Checks

Principal Investigator: Darin Erickson, PhD
Co-Investigators: Bradley Carlin, PhD; Traci Toomey, PhD; Alexander Wagenaar, PhD
Funding Agency: National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism

Goals: The overall goal of this project was to assess whether a pattern of law enforcement compliance checks exists that maximizes effects of the checks for reducing illegal alcohol sales to underage youth, including effects of the temporal frequency of compliance checks (e.g., every 2 months, every 6 months), the spatial frequency of compliance checks (e.g., every establishment, one establishment per block), as well as a possible interaction between the two (e.g., every establishment at least once a year with a nearby establishment every three months).

Publication:

Pub. No. 192. Erickson DJ, Smolenski DJ, Toomey TL, Carlin BP, Wagenaar AC. Do alcohol compliance checks decrease underage sales at neighboring establishments? Journal of Studies on Alcohol and Drugs, 74(6):852-858, 2013.


Policies to Restrict High Alcohol Content Beverages

Principal Investigator: Rhonda Jones-Webb, DrPH
Co-Investigator: Traci Toomey, PhD; Toben Nelson, ScD
Funding Agency: Centers for Disease Control and Prevention

Goals: The main goals of this project were to: (1) Determine whether the sale and consumption of malt liquor is perceived as a problem by city officials and document what has been done at the local level to restrict it. (2) Compare six cities’ efforts to adopt policies to restrict malt liquor sales and determine what factors were critical to their success or failure. (3) Create a national database that provides summaries of key features of local policies that have been successfully adopted to restrict malt liquor sales.


Alcohol Outlet Density, Malt Liquor, and Homicide

Principal Investigator: Rhonda Jones-Webb, DrPH
Co-Investigators: Peter Hannan, MSStat; Darin Erickson, PhD; Alexander Wagenaar, PhD
Funding Agency: National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism

Goals: The specific objectives of this study were to determine: (1) whether homicide rates are significantly greater in African American than in Hispanic, Asian, or White inner city neighborhoods, (2) whether the availability and promotion of malt liquor are significantly greater in African American than in Hispanic, Asian, or White inner-city neighborhoods, and (3) whether the effect of neighborhood racial/ethnic composition on homicide in African American inner-city neighborhoods is attenuated after adjusting for the alcohol outlet density rates, and the availability and promotion of malt liquor in these neighborhoods.

Publication:
Pub. No. 169. Jones-Webb R, McKee P, Hannan P, Wall M, Pham L, Erickson DJ, Wagenaar AC. Alcohol and malt availability and promotion and homicide in inner cities. Substance Use and Misuse, 43:159-177, 2008. 


Assessing Density of Alcohol Outlets, Other Outlets and Crime

Principal Investigator: Traci L. Toomey, PhD
Co-Investigators: Bradley Carlin, PhD; Darin Erickson, PhD; Eileen Harwood, PhD
Funding Agency: National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism

Goals: To assess whether: (1) densities of different types of alcohol establishments are positively related to a wide range of alcohol-related crimes; (2) densities of non-alcohol businesses and other neighborhood physical structures (i.e., parks, schools, and religious institutions), and levels of neighborhood activism are associated with crime rates; and (3) these neighborhood structures and activism moderate the observed associations between densities of alcohol establishments and different types of crime..

Publications:

Pub. No. 205. Erickson DJ, Carlin BP, Lenk KM, Quick HS, Harwood EM, Toomey TL. Do neighborhood attributes moderate the relationship between alcohol establishment density and crime? Prevention Science, 16(2):254-64, 2015. PMCID: PMC4058421. 

Pub. No. 186. Toomey TL, Erickson DJ, Carlin BP, Quick HS, Harwood EM, Lenk KM, Ecklund AM. Is the density of alcohol establishments related to nonviolent crime? Journal of Studies on Alcohol and Drugs, 73(1):21-25, 2012. 

Pub. No. 189. Toomey TL, Erickson DJ, Carlin BP, Lenk KM, Quick HS, Jones A. Harwood EM. The association between density of alcohol establishments and violent crime within urban neighborhoods. Alcoholism: Clinical and Experimental Research. 36(8):1468-1473, 2012. 


Assessing Comprehensiveness and Quality of Alcohol Screening, Treatment, and Prevention Systems for Young Adults within Educational Systems

Principal Investigator: Traci L. Toomey, PhD
Co-Investigators: Toben Nelson, ScD; Darin Erickson, PhD; Ken Winters, PhD
Funding Agency: Robert Wood Johnson Foundation

Goals: This two-year study focused on post-secondary educational systems and their capacity to implement comprehensive alcohol screening and treatment/intervention programs and policies for their students. The primary focus was to assess quality of programs and policies and comprehensiveness of systems of alcohol programs and policies, as well as potential barriers to increasing the availability and quality of these policies and services.

Publications:
Pub. No. 180. Nelson TF, Toomey TL, Lenk KM, Erickson, DJ, Winters KC. Implementation of NIAAA College Drinking Task Force Recommendations: How are colleges doing 6 years later? Alcoholism: Clinical and Experimental Research, 34(10):1687-1693, 2010. 

Pub. No. 183. Winters KC, Toomey TL, Nelson TF, Erickson DJ, Lenk, KM, Miazga, M. Screening for alcohol problems among 4-year colleges and universities.  Journal of American College Health, 59(5):350-357, 2011. 

Pub. No. 184. Toomey TL, Miazga M, Lenk KM, Erickson DJ, Winters KC, Nelson TF. Enforcing alcohol policies on college campuses: Reports from college enforcement officials. Journal of Drug Education. 41(3):327-344, 2011. 

Pub. No. 187. Lenk KM, Erickson DJ, Nelson TF, Winters KC, Toomey TL. Alcohol policies and practices among four-year colleges in the U.S.: Prevalence and patterns. Journal of Studies on Alcohol and Drugs, 73(3):361-367, 2012.

Pub. No. 191. Toomey TL, Nelson TF, Winters KC, Miazga MJ, Lenk KM, Erickson DJ. Characterizing college systems for addressing student alcohol use: Latent class analysis of U.S. four-year colleges. Journal of Studies on Alcohol and Drugs, 74(5):777-786, 2013. 


Assessment of Illegal Alcohol Sales, Patron BAC Levels, Alcohol Control Policies, and Enforcement at Sport Stadiums

Principal Investigator: Traci L. Toomey, PhD
Co-Investigator: Darin Erickson, PhD
Funding agency: Robert Wood Johnson Foundation

Goals: To evaluate the propensity for illegal alcohol sales at sport stadiums, assess blood alcohol levels of patrons leaving stadiums through breathalyzer measurements, assess stadium policies and practices, and assess law enforcement practices regarding alcohol use/problems at stadiums.

Publications:

Pub. No. 173. Toomey TL, Erickson DJ, Lenk KM, Kilian G. Likelihood of illegal alcohol sales at professional sport stadiums. Alcoholism: Clinical & Experimental Research, 32(11):1859-1864, 2008.

Pub. No. 176. Lenk KM, Toomey TL, Erickson DJ. Alcohol-related problems and enforcement at professional sports stadiums. Drugs: Education, Prevention & Policy, 16(5): 451–462, 2009.

Pub. No. 181. Lenk KM, Toomey TL, Erickson DJ., Kilian GR, Nelson T, Fabian, LA.  Alcohol policies and practices at professional sports stadiums. Public Health Reports, 125(5):665-673, 2010.

Pub. No. 182. Erickson DJ, Toomey TL, Lenk KM, Kilian GR, Fabian LEA. Can we assess blood alcohol levels of attendees leaving professional sporting events?  Alcoholism: Clinical and Experimental Research, 35(4):689-694, 2011.


Propensity for Obtaining Alcohol through Shoulder Tapping

Principal Investigator: Traci L. Toomey, PhD
Co-Investigator: Darin Erickson, PhD
Funding Agency: Robert Wood Johnson Foundation

Goals: To assess whether adults when approached outside a store will buy alcohol for youth (“shoulder tapping”).

Publications:
Pub. No. 166. Toomey TL, Fabian LEA, Erickson DJ, Lenk KM. Propensity for obtaining alcohol through shoulder tapping. Alcoholism: Clinical and Experimental Research, 31(7):1218-1233, 2007.

Pub. No. 172. Fabian LEA, Toomey TL, Lenk KM, Erickson DJ. Where do underage college students get alcohol? Journal of Drug Education 38(1):15-26, 2008. 


 

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