An attractive couple cooking dinner. A wine bottle on the counter. A casual sip that looks like part of everyday life.
According to a randomized study published in JAMA Pediatrics, those subtle cues may influence how young adults feel about drinking in the moment.
Researchers from Rutgers University and Harvard University recruited a national sample of adults ages 18 to 24 and randomly assigned them to view one of two simulated social media feeds. One group saw 20 short Instagram-style posts from lifestyle influencers that included alcohol consumption or alcohol imagery. The other group saw similar posts from the same influencers, matched for setting and tone, but without alcohol.
After viewing the posts, participants were asked about their desire to drink. Those exposed to alcohol-related content were 73% more likely than those in the non-alcohol group to report an increased desire to drink immediately after watching the videos.
The videos were not traditional advertisements.
“None of the videos were overt commercials for alcohol,” said Jon-Patrick Allem, associate professor at the Rutgers School of Public Health. “It is something far more subtle than that. This is content people come across in their normal perusing of Instagram or TikTok, just the goings-on of daily life for the influencers in the video.”
The effect was even stronger among participants who viewed the influencers as trustworthy, honest and knowledgeable. In that group, individuals were more than five times as likely to report heightened desire to drink after seeing alcohol in the posts.
The study does not show that a brief increase in desire translates into actual drinking. It also does not examine long-term exposure or repeated viewing over months or years. Instead, it isolates a short-term psychological response in a controlled setting. Still, the randomized design allows researchers to say that the reported increase in desire followed exposure to alcohol-related content, rather than simply being associated with it.
The findings arrive at a time when overall alcohol use among young people has declined compared with previous generations. At the same time, heavy drinking remains common among those who do drink. As online spaces increasingly shape daily life, researchers argue that the type of content viewed may matter as much as total screen time.
“Decades of research show that the earlier someone takes their first drink, the more likely they are to experience alcohol-related problems later in life,” said Alex Russell, assistant professor at Harvard Medical School and co-author of the study. “Delaying drinking initiation is therefore a key prevention strategy. As online spaces like social media increasingly shape youth drinking behaviors, prevention efforts must also focus on these digital environments.”
Alcohol consumption is linked to increased risk of several cancers, including cancers of the mouth, throat, esophagus and colon. The authors note that even subtle normalization of drinking may contribute to broader public health concerns, particularly among young adults who are highly engaged with social media.
The takeaway is not that every influencer post leads to drinking. It is that everyday digital environments may contain cues that shape desire in ways viewers do not consciously register. For young adults navigating a media landscape where lifestyle and marketing often blur together, those cues can accumulate.
This study was supported by grants from the National Cancer Institute and the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism. One author reported NIH grant support during the conduct of the study.