Results of a study by the Journal of Studies on Alcohol and Drugs has proven wrong a common view held today. It has often been thought that teens who drink with their parents are not prone to abuse alcohol as they get older, but this new study shows that thinking is incorrect. In fact, teens who drink with parents end up drinking more and still face harmful consequences of their drinking.
For this study, a group of 1,900 teens were monitored from the seventh to ninth grade. Half of them were from Victoria, Australia where drinking alcohol in small amounts with parents is widely accepted. The other half were from Washington state where drinking is considered taboo under all circumstances for everyone under 21. By the time they reached the 8th grade, 67% of the Australian teens had drunk alcohol with their parents and 35% of the Washington teens had done the same thing. While they were in the 9th grade, 36% of these teens who drank faced negative consequences from drinking, including blackouts, violence, and not knowing when to stop drinking. This also happened to 21% of the Washington teens. Both groups also noted that they were more prone to get drunk as time progressed and they started drinking even when their parents weren’t around.
Barbara J. McMorris from the University of Minnesota’s School of Nursing, who led the research, came to the conclusion that this study proves that “Kids need parents to be parents and not drinking buddies. Adults need to be clear about what messages they are sending.”
I am of the opinion that drinking is fine as long as it’s done in moderation and maybe it’s best that parents demonstrate to their teens how to drink responsibly without letting their teens drink with them.
29Who hath woe? who hath sorrow? who hath contentions? who hath babbling? who hath wounds without cause? who hath redness of eyes? 30They that tarry long at the wine; they that go to seek mixed wine. [Proverbs 23]
Source: Journal of Studies on Alcohol and Drugs, vol. 72, issue 3, May 2011.
–posted by Harry A. Gaylord–
report states that 23% of men in this age group and 9% of women in the age group admitted to drinking five or more drinks in one sitting (the definition of binge drinking) during the past month. The researchers in the study pointed out that this trend has serious health implications for the middle-aged and elderly involved in this trend. Since they are not considered alcoholics and binge drink irregularly, if they have health problems arising from the bingeing, their doctors may not be able to screen them accurately for health problems that are exacerbated by the binge drinking.
