Drinking among teenagers is prone to cause long term damages in their life. At the adolescent stage, teenagers brain are still developing up until the they are in the 20’s. It is a fact that alcohol causes brain damages to anyone who consumes it but because of this occurrence in adolescent’s body,they are more affected by this. According to Saner in the article Health: Drunk young things: Teenage drinkers don 't just risk making fools of
Those opposed to these views argue that developmental studies generally pinpoint peer pressure to pre and early adolescents, thus older children are not subject to this pressure, and this is not a cause of underage drinking. However, peer pressure is not the issue. These children are not forced into drinking by their peers. They simply correlate drinking with acceptance, thus they drink to be accepted. Many experts view drinking as a natural occurrence for children, they state, "They [children] are simply testing their limits" (Benenson 36). If this is how our children view alcohol, they are viewing it in all the wrong ways. We must help them understand that alcohol will not help them 'fit in,' it will only hurt them much sooner than later.
By definition and federal law, underage drinking is any person under 21 who are consuming alcohol. In 2011, Missouri had 258 total alcohol impaired fatalities. Forty-six, or thirty percent, of these fatalities were under the age of twenty-one (Century Council). Surely, it does not happen in small towns like Warrensburg. Yes, in fact, it does happen in Warrensburg, the reason being it is a college town, and Whiteman Air Force Base is just twenty minutes outside the town. Here are stories of underage drinking incidences that occurred in Warrensburg, Jackson County, and St. Joseph.
Just a few known reasons for under age drinking are: peer pressure, partys, etc. But the most common reason for drinking is “breaking the law.” 87% of high schoolers have drank alcohol.Alcoa leads us to believe that a large amount of kids under the age of 17 or 18 have drank at least once before. We are all aware why kids drink, I mean is common
Everyone hates to see their parents fight and don't like being in the middle of it. Some teens feel the need to drink because it's a way out of their sticky situations. Parents need to pay more attention to their kids and they need to realize that their kids are watching them and following in their footsteps. If a teen has a parent who is a drinker they have a greater chance of becoming a drinker. Alcohol causes people to be unaware of their surrounding and causes people to make bad choices.
Why do teenagers choose to drink? This question is ever-present in the minds of parents and caregivers. Teenagers who drink do not comprehend the widespread and longterm effects of their actions. Consuming alcohol is very harmful to the teenager, friends, family, and even strangers. Nearly ten million young people ages twelve to twenty reported consuming alcohol in the past thirty days, with “consumed” being defined as more than a couple sips (“11 Fact About Teens And Alcohol”). These are not good numbers for underaged individuals. Teen drinking is an important factor which can lead to serious injury or death. Teen drinking is a serious issue with life-altering consequences and cannot be ignored.
Alcohol can damage a teenagers health, brain and many other parts of the body as the years go by. “A 2002 article in the journal of studies on alcohol reported that alcohol may interfere with brain development in adolescents, resulting in mild mental impairment. Alcohol-induced changes in the structure or size of the hippocampus (a key part of the brain) may cause lifelong mental problems” (Youngerman, Barry). Another affect teenagers fail to realize is alcohol can be addicting. “When people ask what you hope to be when you grow up, no one will answer “an alcoholic”. But every year, teenagers who thought they could handle a few drinks fall into the trap” (Youngerman, Barry). Many people say they love how alcohol puts them in a daze, a carefree mindset. No one thinks a one time thing can end up becoming a lifestyle or how they function
Nearly 25 percent of teens drink alcohol because they think it is fun; however the problems it may bring are not so fun (Hyde 22). There over six times more teen deaths per year from alcohol than any other drug (O’Malley 30). Alcohol affects the body of teens as well as all of the developmental processes. A major issue of teens drinking is that it increases the chance of becoming an alcoholic in the future; which leads to lowered self-control, impaired judgment, and lowered inhibition (Heath 12). Alcohol can completely change the life of a teen from the time they start drinking till death. Alcohol affects so many aspects of a person’s life and once it does, it is so hard to get life back to normal. Alcohol effects teens by harming them
A possible reason why teens consume alcohol would simply be just for the risk of doing it (Underage Drinking). According to the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism, which is a very respectable health and government organization that “supports and conducts biomedical and behavioral research on the causes, consequences, treatment, and prevention of alcoholism and alcohol-related problems”, scientists believe that since the brain continues to develop well into a person's twenties, a teen may not fully understand the consequences of underage drinking and some teenagers fulfill their risk needs by consuming alcohol (National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism). This could possibly explain why teenagers
We can’t completely stop underage drinking but we can try our best to reduce it. By acknowledging the factors that plays a huge part in encouraging teenage alcohol abuse such as environment, personality, or simply genetics. For years we have watched teenagers become a victim to binge drinking alcohol abuse and face the tragic outcomes. Parents and guardians tend to get angry and upset not just at the teens but themselves as well. Instead of addressing the situation with anger and aggression we should all consider the factors that lead them to turn to alcohol or become dependent on it. Alcohol abuse amongst teens has been around for some time now and today the level of underage excessive alcohol consumption continues to progress within time. We, as friends and family, experience the suffering and risks that results from careless alcohol consumption all while feeling completely helpless toward the consumer themselves. By having teenagers acknowledge consequences we will be able to find a better solution and hopefully reduce the lives ruined or at risk by this set
First off, alcohol addiction and abuse among teenagers today is a bigger problem than ever before. The root of the problem lies in the fact that the teens are so exposed to the culture of this day and age, leading them to where they have easy access to alcohol. For example, their parents may already be alcoholics, and it's merely a few bad decisions later which could cause the child to have a few drinks and cloud their judgement. This is a big problem because their young bodies have never encountered anything like alcohol before, so in turn, the body does not know how to process it, and therefore leads to their downfall. A publication released by the National Institute of Alcoholism and Alcohol Abuse (NIAA) suggests that by age 18, an astounding 60% of US teens would have had at least one drink. Moreover, according to the NIAA, youth between the ages of 12 and 20 will often binge drink as well.
Drinking alcohol is not only affects an individual but also damages relationships and society in general in terms of violence and crime. The risk of accidental and violent injury increase because of adolescent drinking behavior. A young adult is typically entering a new phase of independence from their parents through college or the workforce. They are more susceptible to binge drinking without control. Besides, adolescence is a time of physical and emotional changes as they pass from childhood into adulthood. Their emotion changes very quickly which may be negative or positive. If they are continues to binge drinking, their actions and behavior could cause lots of trouble to others especially friends, family, and sibling. Also, research shows
Did you know that over a third of young people engage in binge drinking or hazardous drinking? Alcohol use and misuse by teenagers seems to become a big problem, but what is the problem for that and what is encouraging the youth to drink? In this essay I want to find the reasons for all those problems.
Research suggests boredom is another reason for young people to drink as this gives them something to do (Hayley Jarvis 2009) also depression can have an effect on the amount young people consume as alcohol acts like a depressant this can make the young person feel very low (Erica Wittenberg & Jim Parker 2003).
Teenagers face many difficult decisions in their lives and have many people in their lives that influence them. One of the major groups that influence teens is their peer group. “Since teenagers are not yet comfortable with themselves, they have a strong need to be accepted by their peers. And to be accepted, they feel they have to be just like their peers” (Ruth Maxwell, p. 24). From Maxwell we learn that teenagers will use alcohol to be accepted by a group. As age progresses the number of alcohol users progress 73 percent of kids that are from the ages of 16-18 are drinkers. In addition, around 90 percent of high school seniors have experienced alcohol at least once in their life.