The Moderating Role Of Impulsivity In Drinking

Previous research in this field has led to the determination that the consumption of caffeinated alcoholic beverages leads to an increased level of high-risk behavior among adolescents and young adults. Some of these high-risk behaviors include driving while intoxicated, unprotected sexual activity, and illegal substance abuse. In addition, heavy binge drinking is widely accepted as contributing to “neurocognitive deficits” and increased “morbidity and mortality.” Much of the previous research has focused on college-aged young adults. This study hopes to greatly shed light on the age group from 13 to 17 years old (pre-collegiate adolescents). In addition, the study hopes to

In today’s society college students engaging in consuming alcohol is expected. Dr. Lori Hart explained to the students the mindset of the typical college student engaging in alcohol; how the brain is undeveloped, drink responsibly and information on binge drinking.

Cook, Moore, and Yamada concluded that excessive drinking can affect the completion of high school and college. Wolaver concluded that binge drinking among males and females could risk receiving a lower GPA. A negative correlation was said to be found among females in college, versus a positive one on females who attended high school. With the use of standard regression analysis, by DeSimone, and Wolaver, they were able to find that GPA was lower by 0.4 for binge drinkers. The studies on GPA effected by drinking concluded that it had negative effect. First GPA was concluded by self-reported, second a cross sectional data was used. Add Health was used to study health – related “behavior of adolescent in grades 7 through 12”(Balsa). The study consisted of interviews that were done at home, and were re interviewed a year later (Balsa). “The main interest of this study was abstracted from GPA in school transcripts, which had a linkage to the respondents at each wave” (Balsa). CAPI/CASI questions were used during this process. Although results in males were negative, alcohol still had an effect on GPA. However, for females the coefficient was smaller for binge-drinking and excessive drinking. Male’s excessive alcohol use of 100 drinks per month was related with an increase of 4 % probability of difficulty in school. In “females the coefficient was positive and larger than males and out of four, five were statistically significant”

Teens that do the underage drinking can have many health problems. Health problems that can be caused by underage drinking is Death, serious injuries, impaired judgment, increased risk for physical and sexual assault, brain development problems. All of these health problems are serious, and they aren’t thought about by teens before they have a drink. (Underage) Impaired judgments can be considered irresponsible drinking. Significant increase were also found for other variables: “cutting class after drinking” jumped from 9% to almost 12%; “missing class because of hangover” went from 26% to 28%; “getting lower grades because of drinking” rose from 5% to 7% and “been in a fight after drinking” increased from 12% to 17%; these are examples of irresponsible behavior. (Dr. Ruth)

Introductory Psychology students (N = 305) from a mid-western university participated in the study online for course credit. Sixty-eight percent of the participants identified as female, 32% of the participants identified as male, and one participant did not indicate their gender. The majority of the participants were Caucasian (73%), and the average age of the participants was 19.04 (SD = 1.10).

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.

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.

By the time a parent sends their teenager off to college, chances are that they have already not only had their first drink, but have also been drunk numerous times. When an individual enters college the binge drinking doesn’t decrease, but increases. A plethora of variables have an effect on how college students view binge drinking and their attitude towards how much an individual binges drink, but three that will be stressed are gender, race, and age of first alcoholic consumption. The following articles highlight the correlations between the three variables in regards to the evolution of individuals drinking habits, attitudes about binge drinking in college, how the age of first consumptions determines how severe of a binge drinker and individual will become,

In this case heavy episodic drinking is defined as having five or more drinks in one sitting for men, and more than four for women (Hingzon, Zha, and Weitzman). Binge drinking is well ingrained in college culture, and its effects can be damaging. In 1998, over 500,000 college students had an unintentional alcohol-related injury, over 600,000 were assaulted in an alcohol-related instance, and over 700,000 sexually assaulted (Hingson, Zha, and Weitzman). From these statistics it is evident that the current drinking age in the United States is not preventing college students, who are mostly underage, from partaking in dangerous alcohol-related activity

If a person begins heavy episodic drinking at the age of 12 the behavior increases to 50.5% by the age of 21 and 22 years old. Those of who attended college did not drink as much in adolescents but surpasses the non-college in overall alcohol use and shows a higher genetic influence. The cortical gray and white matter shows changes during normal development. There appears to be improvement in executive function in the frontal lobe, this includes improvement in the white matter connectivity between cortical and subcortical brain regions. The college-age drinker appears to overestimate the amount alcohol is in a standard drink. A biological consequence of heavy drinking includes deficits in memory retention. They used positive family history

When alcohol is consumed it attacks and impairs a variety of cognitive processes (Norton & Halay, 2001). Some of these cognitive processes include: executive decision making, impulse control, modification of emotion, and future preparation (Norton et al., 2001). The focus of this Research Paper will be to examine the cognitive effects of alcohol consumption and any correlations between impulse control (impulsivity) and alcohol consumption. Research studies have shown that alcohol use disrupts the neurocognitive processes involved in self-regulation and is associated with a high level of behavioral disinhibition, which is characteristic of the personality trait impulsivity (Noel, Tomberg, Verbanck & Campanella, 2010).

     A lower dosage of alcohol will damage a young brain compared to a fully mature brain, and young brains are damaged more quickly. Alcohol exposure during adolescence is linked with a reduced ability to learn compared with those not exposed until adulthood.Alcohol is implicated in more than 40 percent of all college academic problems and 28 percent of all college dropouts. At both 2- and 4-year colleges, the heaviest drinkers make the lowest grades.High school students who use alcohol or other

On the other hand, Daugherty, M. (2008) study has revealed that “impulsive behaviors observed in different individuals may be expressed as similar behaviors”. (p.2) no group differences were observed by test on any drinking habit measure. (Marczinski, A. Et Al, 2005). Opposing this side, Karossan O. And Roman E. (2016)) argues that alcohol-induced acute motor activation appears to be context and age dependent with more pronounced effects During adolescents. (p.2). Younger drinkers are usually more tolerant to the effects of alcohol compared to older and assumed mature

Decision making (DM) is a cognitive process defined by the balance between short-term and long-term consequences of individual’s choice (Zorlu, Dermir, Polat, Kuserli and Gulseren, 2013). DM processes have become a principle target of study among causal uncertainty in alcohol research (Zorlu et al., 2013). DM is a skill that plays an important role during the late adolescence and young adulthood, as this is often a time of change, identity formation and educational career development (Schulte, Ramo, Brown, 2009). During the early stages of adolescence, many will experience the use of alcohol, yet little do they know about the effects it will have on the critical stages

The outcome of the study may lead to inaccurate results because the participant pool does not properly portray the population in which the study is collecting data. As a means to account for this source of bias, the study could possibly be opened up to the public instead of privately selecting participants from the university. This way participants come from all backgrounds not only undergraduates and graduates. This study only makes generalizations from the population of 18 through 25 year old young adults who are undergraduates or graduates that have dealt with parents whom suffer from alcoholism, substance use, and mental illness. The study does not generalize the population of 18 through 25 year olds that are not in college. This population that does not attend college are hard to obtain for research and so they will not be represented in the study. The sample’s responses to the survey will allow researchers to make inferences of the behavior of the population of 18 through 25 year olds who are in college.