Pros And Cons Of Binge Drinking

"I work out five days a week in the gym lifting weight & doing cardio. I watch what I eat, but I binge drink pretty much every weekend. Is the drinking that bad, or am I doing enough "good stuff" to offset the drinking?"

“80 percent of teen-agers have tried alcohol, and that alcohol was a contributing factor in the top three causes of death among teens: accidents, homicide and suicide” (Underage, CNN.com pg 3). Students may use drinking as a form of socializing, but is it really as good as it seems? The tradition of drinking has developed into a kind of “culture” fixed in every level of the college student environment. Customs handed down through generations of college drinkers reinforce students' expectation that alcohol is a necessary ingredient for social success. These perceptions of drinking are the going to ruin the lives of the students because it will lead to the development alcoholism. College students who drink a lot, while in a college

Oftentimes students focus on their studies from Sunday through Thursday but as the weekend approaches, their attention shifts from academics to partying. The fact that the majority of their alcohol consumption is over a three day period (Thursday, Friday, Saturday) could be considered binge drinking. Binge drinking is defined as having four to five regular drinks consumed in one sitting, at two or more events within one months time span (Acuff, Soltis, Dennhardt, Bosari, Martens, Murphy, 2017). Another repercussion from binge drinking is second-hand effects. Inevitably, those students that are partying and drinking need the support and guidance of their more academically minded friends. Following a night of drinking, perhaps the drinker needs a ride from a sober friend or perhaps there was drama centered around those that were drinking and need the comfort and encouragement from their sober counterparts. A negative experience with alcohol as a non-drinker defines second-hand effects (Cabalatungan, & McCarthy, 2015).

One risk factor of binge drinking is the alcohol use of peers, and being peer pressured into consuming high amounts of alcohol. As claimed by DrinkWise (2017), peer pressure can lead individuals, especially teenagers to do things that they usually wouldn’t do, and stop them from doing something they would want to do. Peer pressure can confront the individual’s views and morals of what is right and wrong. This is significantly evident in the youth when alcohol is involved, which is due to young people wanting to have a sense of belonging, and wanting to be liked and accepted by their peers. Therefore falling into the pressure of binge drinking in order to fit in with the people around themselves that like to binge

To further develop their position, the author also explores the details of “binge drinking” and states that “youth often consume more alcohol in one sitting than adults, in part because the brain of a maturing adolescent can tolerate more alcohol with delayed effects as compared to the brain of an adult”. They go on to describe the possibilities and dangers of alcohol poisoning and the fact that every year, over four thousand youth deaths involve alcohol consumption. This statistic is backed up not only by the CDC in the article, but also in studies done by the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism.

For my research project I decided to look at binge drinking in teens. Binge drinking interested me because so many teenagers drink alcohol when they go out and don’t know what consequences it has on the body. Binge drinking is the consumption of an unreasonable amount of alcohol in a short period of time. I have chosen to research ‘What are the psychological and physiological effects of binge drinking in teens?’. I chose this question because I wanted to inform myself and other teens on the effects of binge drinking. The research methods used throughout my research were internet articles and a survey.

Presidents of college campuses around the nation face issues of underage drinking and binge drinking on a regular basis and realizes that it is a danger and a problem. “Alcohol consumption is the third leading cause of death in the U.S., a major contributing factor to unintentional injuries, the leading cause of death for youths and young adults, and accounts for an estimated 75,000 or more deaths in the United States annually” (Wechsler 2010). Binge drinking can be loosely defined as consuming five or more drinks at one sitting for men and four drinks for women. Binge drinking amongst college students is a social activity that allows students to let loose and “fit in”.

A youth’s social abilities can be destroyed by underage drinking. Socialization skills are key when a minor is growing up. A minor struggles to find their own independence and find themselves, therefore creating a distance from family relationships and creating new bonds with peers. The youth tend to try to be similar to each other to fit in with the rest, and as a result, children may be pressured into drinking alcohol. When these minors start to drink heavily and frequently, they may develop self esteem issues, depression, disorders, antisocial behavior, and anxiety. This makes underage drinkers more withdrawn from their peers and families than their peers who choose not to drink. Peers who don’t drink do not tend to associate and be friends with the group of people that do drink. This can lead to isolation and also disdain from those who do

One fact that the authors point out is that youths are beginning to drink at lower ages and with more frequency. The statistics range from 47 percent of high school students drinking heavily to 10 million, 28 percent of children that age, reporting alcohol use in the last thirty days. College students reflect those same statistics. Concern is raised about how alcohol use patterns developed in the teen years is not an issue that time resoles. The article then bridges into alcohol’s effects on teens.

Since 1979, the rate of binge drinking has increased 20 percent in non-college women and 40 percent in women who attend college, and this rate continues to rise. College students that are not “of age” to drink legally engage in “pre game” sessions, where the primary goal is to get drunk before attending a social event. To obtain this goal, the young adults “take multiple shots of hard liquor in rapid succession”(McCardell) in locations that are beyond administrative authority. These unsafe and unhealthy drinking behaviors lead to many short and long term health effects. Drinking is driven away from responsible adults who could model moderation for young adults and instead driven into risky settings, heavily weighted with peer pressure and usually not supervised by any non-intoxicated people. While drunk driving is a problem, a study from the National Institute of Alcoholism and Alcohol Abuse states that of 5,000 deaths involving alcohol in those under the age of 21, more than 60 percent of the fatalities occur off of roadways (McCardell). This includes alcohol poisoning deaths that result from binge drinking incidents, which between 1998 and 2005 jumped from 779 to 2290 cases in 18-24 year olds (Glaser). These statistics indicate that the primary problem of this age is not drunk driving, but instead “clandestine binge

Research has supported the observation that young people in America consume alcohol regularly; this prevalence of use increases rapidly during adolescence, as well as a few years afterward (Wagenaar and Wolfson 37). This has come to be a problem among college students. It has been shown through extensive quantitative and qualitative research that those under twenty-one years of age are able to obtain alcohol, which allows them to binge drink. Binge drinking holds many problems for college students: alcohol poisoning, DUIs, traffic accidents, and even fatalities.

Peer Pressure is frequently involved with excessive drinking on college campuses. Alcohol is prominent in the college culture because it is presented at many social affairs and is part of many gatherings with peers. “Because peers are the most salient social referents in the college environment, they are a potent influence on alcohol use. Most new acquaintances at college will be drinkers: recent research indicating that four out of five college students drink. In addition, college peers tend to be more approving of alcohol use.

The United States has one of the highest legal drinking ages among the developed world, and the entire world overall (McCardell). Yet underage drinking is still prevalent in American drinking culture, and typically indicates an instance of binge drinking and often results in dangerous activity (Hingson, Zha, and Weitzman). Supporters of the current federal policy on the drinking age would suggest that drinking under 21 results in these instances of irresponsible drinking by default. Other developed countries in Europe have lower drinking ages and trends that would suggest otherwise (Rooney). The legal drinking age in the United States should be lowered to at least 18 years old to ensure a safer drinking environment for young people and to

The Public Health issue being discussed in this study is binge drinking as well as underage drinking. Binge drinking can be defined as the excess consumption of alcoholic beverages which is considered more than five drinks for men and more than four drinks for women. Several public health issues also arise from binge drinking itself such as, drunk driving and violence. Binge drinking especially while underage can affect health because it can affect the cognitive brain development which may have life long effects. Aside from affecting development binge drinking can put youth at risk for physical/ and or sexual assault and makes youth more vulnerable to engage in unprotected sex which can lead to the transmission of STDs or unwanted pregnancy. Binge drinking can also lead to death due to alcohol poisoning and

Based on the results, they found that the role of friends in leisure activities affect the binge drinking behaviour, which supported by the Social Development Model (Catalano & Hawkins, 1996). In this model, it proposed that the influence of social learning and control affect the behaviour. For example, if the person like to engage with the prosocial behaviours group, they will develop the same behaviour with the group which is prosocial behaviour, and if they like to join the antisocial group, they will get the same antisocial behaviour from that group (Catalano & Hawkins, 1996). This factor contributed highest frequency associated in binge drinking based on Sanchez et al (2011). Most of student drinking when they were going out with their