Methodological procedures to evaluate the impact of the New Mexico Alcohol Server Education Act included use of pseudo patrons and crash data. Reported here are the results of a qualitative process analysis. Forty-one tape-recorded interviews were conducted at randomly selected licensed on-site establishments. A total of fifty-one individuals were interviewed, 33 servers, 14 managers and 4 owners. Alcohol servers did report an increase in awareness of New Mexico State laws. With some variations reflective of position and length of experience, alcohol servers reported little change in their serving practices, understanding of the effects of alcohol, knowledge of impairment versus intoxication, or knowledge of server intervention techniques. Servers reported a number of perceived barriers to refusing service to obviously intoxicated patrons. These include intimidation, fear of losing tips, lack of perceived management support, job demands and their view of their relationship to patrons. These topics were not universally covered in the training.
Abstract