Measuring associations among social identification, group norms, and alcohol consumption: Testing a Social Identity Model of Behavioural Associations (SIMBA)

Drawing upon both social identity and balanced identity theories, the Social Identity Model of Behavioural Associations (SIMBA) presents a novel way of conceptualising and measuring the relationships among the constructs of social identity, group norms, and individual-level behaviour—that is, as cognitive-behavioural associations that mutually interact in a triadic constellation and can be measured both implicitly and explicitly. While the social identity approach suggests that the interaction between social identification and group norms shapes our individual behaviour, the SIMBA—through adopting the methodological underpinnings of balanced identity theory—advances upon this theorising to highlight that interactions among the three constructs are reciprocal and extend to the prediction of both social identification and group norms. Across four studies (total N=540), we tested the SIMBA in the context of drinking behaviour in relation to student (Studies 1, 2, and 3) and British national (Study 4) identities. On implicit measures, there was good support for the prediction that the strength of any one association in the SIMBA could be predicted by the interactive strength of the remaining two. Evidence for this prediction was largely absent on explicit Likert-type measures; we argue that this difference may be dependent on the explicit measures possessing theoretically meaningful zero-points.