Drinkaware Monitor 2023

Background

In 2022, our Drinkaware Monitor found that 3 in 10 UK adults (29%) were concerned about someone else's drinking. This year, we aimed to delve deeper into this, examining whether individuals act on their concerns by initiating conversations with their partners, friends, or family. We wanted to understand how comfortable individuals are in initiating these conversations and examining what happens as a result.

In addition, we wanted to explore public attitudes to alcohol and drinking to identify social norms that might make it difficult for us, as a nation, to start having more honest conversations about alcohol.

Key findings

There are some encouraging trends around drinking in the UK

• Whilst the proportion of non-drinkers in the UK has not changed in the last year, drinkers appear to be drinking less frequently: 39% drink alcohol less often than weekly compared to 33% in 2019.
• UK drinkers are increasingly drinking within low risk drinking guidelines, set by the UK Chief Medical Officers, of 14 units per week.
• There has been a significant fall in people drinking at home alone (but if they do drink at home alone it is likely that they do it regularly).
• But those struggling the most financially were most likely to have changed their drinking habits over the last 12 months due to the rising cost-of-living. One in ten drinkers struggling financially report drinking more alcohol in the last year whilst four in ten have been drinking less.

One in four (26%) UK adults are concerned about someone else's drinking

• Concern is most likely to be for a friend's drinking (36% of those with a concern indicate it relates to a friend, rising to 44% amongst males).
• When it comes to their own drinking, one in ten (11%) UK drinkers report that family, friends or a health professional have expressed concern about their drinking.
• UK adults are less comfortable having a conversation with friends or family about their drinking (only 29% would feel very comfortable starting a conversation with family and 24% with friends, compared to 45% with a partner).
• One in five people who are concerned about someone else's drinking have not said anything or taken any action.

Meaningful conversations about alcohol matter

• A third (35%) of people who had a concern raised about their drinking indicated that they made changes as a result.
• The qualitative research found that having these conversations can be difficult and emotional.
• Participants who have had conversations with people because they are concerned about their drinking often use different strategies to try to get the person to see that their drinking may be problematic, including being accusatory, being supportive or providing 'evidence' about their drinking habits or behaviours.
• Strategies used differ depending on the relationship and on how problematic their drinking is deemed to be, and some people have used multiple strategies during multiple conversations.
• Conversations often focus on how often or how much someone is drinking and the impact of this, but less often on the reasons why people feel the need to drink in this way.
• Conversations can have an impact on the person's drinking, or on their perceptions of their drinking, although this may take some time and may only occur after having multiple conversations.
• Ultimately, the impact of the conversations seems to largely depend on how open the drinker is to accepting that their drinking may be harmful or problematic.
  
  

View the UK report below or download it. You can also view findings for Scotland, Wales, and Northern Ireland in our individual nation reports or download them below.

For more information on research objectives, survey questions and methodology, see the tabs at the bottom of this page. Alternatively, download our technical report.