Abstract
The focus of this paper is on informal control of drinking, indicated by criticism of people in the social network on someone's alcohol consumption. It studies country and gender differences in the extent drinkers suffering from typical symptoms of heavy or prolonged alcohol use report informal control from others (reactive informal control), and country and gender differences in the extent comments on someone's drinking are (also) directed at those who do not suffer from these symptoms (pro-active informal control). The data come from eighteen general population surveys, selected from an integrated dataset on drinking and drinking-related factors including more than 35 countries. The criteria for inclusion were that data for both men and women were available and that at least 3 items about symptoms of severe physiological consequences and about criticism of drinking had valid responses. The results show that men suffering from typical symptoms of heavy or prolonged alcohol use are more likely to be criticized than equivalent women (reactive control). Irrespective of gender, reactive informal control is more prevalent in poorer countries and in countries with a high proportion of abstainers. Concerning pro-active control, among women a larger part of criticism appeared to be directed at those who (as yet) do not suffer from symptoms typical for heavy or prolonged alcohol use. There is a lot of variation between countries in pro-active informal control. This variation is only weakly related to prosperity of a country but not to its proportion of abstainers.