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Cause and effect of drunk driving
causes and effects of teen alcohol and drug abuse
Cause and effect of drunk driving
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The media's view of adolescence, alcohol and driving is extremely clear. Almost every article, report or documentary on these things (especially when they are combined) portrays irresponsibility, danger and/or violence and aggression. To put it more clearly the media's view on the situation that occurs or can occur when adolescents are left to make their own decisions or choices is that any given adolescent will choose to drink alcohol and most likely choose to drive while under the influence. Here are a few examples (extracted from articles, publications and the web) of how the media views adolescents, alcohol and driving: · Use of alcohol and other drugs is associated with the leading causes of death and injury (eg. vehicle crashes) among teenagers and young adults. (Centers for Disease Control {CDC}, "Alcohol and Other Drug Use Among High School Students--United States, 1990," Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report {MMWR}, 11/91, p. 776). · The total cost of alcohol use by youth--including traffic crashes, violent crime, burns, drowning, suicide attempts, fetal alcohol syndrome, alcohol poisoning and treatment--is more than $58 billion per year. (DT Levy, K Stewart, et al "Costs of Underage Drinking" {report prepared for the US Department of Justice Office of Juvenile Delinquency Prevention), Pacific Institute for Research and Evaluation, 7/99}). · 40% of American College students have "binged" on alcohol during the past two weeks (1999 info). (NIDA, 1999 Monitoring the Future Study, College Students and Young Adults · Young adults/adolescents ages 18-25 are most likely to binge or drink heavily. 54% of the drinkers in this age group binge and about one in four are heavy drinkers! (NIDA, 1998 National Household Survey on Drug Abuse). · Teenage drivers cause about five times as many vehicle-related deaths as middle aged drivers. · In 1996, over 17,000 people died in alcohol-related car crashes in the United States. An alarming 2,315 of them were adolescents (between 15 and 20 years old). · Almost half of all motor vehicle crashes that kill teenagers are
“Spank them moderately and send them to church and don’t give them anything to drink until they’re 18, and that’s about all we can say.” This advice was given by the Associated Press to parents of teenagers regarding the topic of alcohol. The facts have shown, however, that this is not all parents can say or do. So people believe talking to children about alcohol will make them more curious and more prone to using alcohol. But studies have shown that children who receive frank information about the dangers of alcohol are less likely to want to try it. Education is the key to alcohol prevention.
The article “Adolescent Brain Development and Underage Drinking in the United States: Identifying Risks of Alcohol Use in College Populations” written by Marisa Silveri, PhD, aims to emphasize the the negative behavioral consequences with underage alcohol use. Silveri is a highly decorated professor of psychiatry at Harvard Medical School, who has been studying the neurobiology of brain development and consequences of alcohol and drug abuse using preclinical and clinical models for two decades. Her substantial background in psychology and neurobiology make her a highly credible source, and improves the author’s chance of making the point really stick. The article is easy to follow, and split up in subcategories that each cover a specific point the author is trying to make. Professor Silveri, with great credibility, uses logic and also emotional appeal to effectively convince the reader that alcohol use affects the brain negatively, and the importance to discourage the excessive consumption of alcohol by adolescents.
It really is no secret that if the minimum legal drinking age were lowered, a large number of teens would then drink for perhaps the first time. “The age group with the most drivers involved in fatal crashes with Blood Alcohol Content levels of .08 or higher during 2011 was the twenty-one to twenty-four-year-olds” (“National Highway Traffic Facts”). Young adults are just as irresponsible at eighteen as they are at twenty-one, maybe even more irresponsible. The teenagers will indulge themselves on what they feel is a luxury the first chance they get. The young adults abuse the alcohol, and then go driving because even at twenty-one through twenty-four they are still not as responsible. If the age is lowered to eighteen, many eighteen-year-olds will go out and drink alcohol for the first time. The age group may rise to number one in fatal crashes. The National Highway Traff...
Each year, about 5,000 teens are killed or injured in traffic crashes as a result of underage drinking and about 1,900 are due to car accidents. (National Highway Traffic Safety Administration and U.S. Department of Transportation) In the newsletter, safety in numbers by National highway traffic administration and U.S department of transportation “Of all the people who died in motor vehicle crashes during 2012, 31 percent died in crashes involving a drunk driver, and this percentage remains unchanged for the past 10 years” (Vol 1, 2013). Crashes involving alcohol include fatal crashes in which a driver had a BAC of .01 g/ ld. or higher (Underage Drinking Statistics)). Deadly crashes involving alcohol are twice as common in teens compared to people 21 and older. This is because teens’ judgment skills are harmed more by alcohol. Teens who drink not only risk hurting themselves, they risk hurting their friends, family, and even strangers when driving intoxicated. Teens and parents both need a strong reminder that underage drinking is illegal and can have disastrous consequences. According to Health Day News, “one study found that in 2011, 36 percent of U.S. college students said they'd gone binge drinking (five or more drinks in one sitting) within the past two weeks, as compared to 43 percent of college students in 1988. Since 2006, the current law has reduced the rate of drunk driving crashes among young Americans” (Preidt, 2014 and DeJong, 2014). This proves that lives have been saved after the legal drinking age increased. According to an article in Time Magazine called “Should the Drinking Age Be Lowered?”, “lowering the drinking age to 18 would stop infantilizing college students, but it would probably kill mor...
Just like the teenage boy that died in the wreck, most young teen drivers think they are invincible and are owners of the road which is all due to lack of maturity. The mind set of young drivers now days is “I’m too young to die”, or “it wont happen to me” and they are so blinded by the immature thinking that it gets them in trouble. Some traits generally linked with the immaturity are: chance taking, testing limits, poor-decision making, overconfidence, speeding, following to closely, and dangerous passing (Williams). When you have youthful age and immature characteristics combined the crash possibility is enlarged. The 15-16 age groups are among the most accident prone of most groups (“Don’t”), so why then would we want them behind the wheel? “Most U.S. states license at age 16, but the minimum age for a regular license is 14 in South Dakota and 15 in five other states including: Hawaii, Idaho, Montana, New Mexico, and South Carolina”, stated Allan F. Williams. Youthful age and immature thinking is part of the reason wh...
Car crashes are the leading cause of death for teens, and about one-third of those are alcohol related. Don’t be that person that lets a drunken driver on the streets; be the difference.
To make its point the article uses facts and statistics to prove that teenage drinking is a huge problem in the United States. We learn, "Beer is the alcoholic beverage of choice for kids, preferred by 27% of all children," and, "1.1 billion cans of beer and 300 million bottles of wine coolers were consumed by junior and senior high school students." The article also uses statistics to prove the unfortunate consequences of drinking and states, "In 1997, 3,336 drivers 15 to 20years old died, an additional 365,000 were injured in motor vehicle crashes.
An average of one teen dies each hour in a car crash in the United States, and nearly 50 percent of those crashes involve alcohol, according to the National Highway Traffic and Safety Administration (NHSTA). Alcohol is the drug most widely abused by teens. Alcohol abuse occurs among all geographic, ethnic and racial groups. Teens easily succumb to peer pressure when deciding whether or not to use alcohol. Unfortunately, they lack the coping and judgment skills necessary to handle alcohol wisely.
Driving under influence or with high blood alcohol content (BAC) increases the risk of car accidents, vehicular deaths, and more so highway injuries across all age-groups. In fact, an intoxicated driver with relatively higher BAC increases his/her risk of death by up to 380 times in single-vehicle crash (DeMichele, Lowe & Payne, 2014). Drunk driving is often considered as the largest social problem in the modern day society since 40 to 45% of all fatal traffic accidents usually involve drunk drivers. While 16 is the average blood alcohol content among some seriously injured drinking drivers, the culture of driving under influence can only be stopped through the development of a plausible plan to prevent it (Sloan, Eldred & Xu, 2014).
Effects of Drinking and Driving I’ve never seen drinking and driving on a daily planner or heard anyone say I think I’ll get a DUI today. I have heard people say “it’s my life, and if I want to drink and drive I will”. Well, it’s not just your life that is affected by the results of drinking and driving. When you make that choice to drink and drive you are taking the lives of family, friends, and strangers into your hands. You don’t have to get into an accident and kill somebody for the results to destroy you or someone else’s life. Drinking and driving can be the cause of many traumatic life changing events.
The results were on the average three to four drinks a week. The third question was, "How much do you usually drink?" The average number of beers was eight and the average number of shots was seven. The fourth question was, "Have you ever drank alcohol before driving and 68% said yes! One of the last questions I asked was, "What would you do if you killed someone drinking and driving?" The majority replied that they could not live with themselves. Just through talking to people and going to parties, I have seen most people drink to get drunk, not many people drink just a drink or two. Many students don't feel that drinking is a crime because they are not hurting any one unless they are driving drunk. Drinking is a crime and there are many penalties for the teen who chooses to break the law. For a first time offender a teen would be taken to jail , finger printed, and photographed. At the time of arrest, if drunk, one could be taken to detoxification (detox) ...
What is the number one cause of teenage deaths in the United States? In this country a teenager dies due to alcohol related car accidents every twenty-two seconds.
Do you know how many people die every day in the United States due to drunk driving? If not, here is the answer, approximately twenty-eight people die because of drunk driving. There is not a day that has gone by without having an auto accident relating intoxicated drivers and no days without an ambulance running on the street with emergency lights on chasing for victims. In 2014, 1.1 million drivers were arrested for driving under the influence and 9,967 people were killed in alcohol related crashes. Alcohol slows down the activity of the person’s central nervous system, including the brain which makes them react slower and reduce concentration while driving. In order for one to drive safe, he/she has to be sober and active without any distraction.
The growing awareness of alcohol hazards has made people more cautious of their drinking habits, particularly young adults. At present young adults have the highest prevalence of alcohol consumption than any other age group. They also drink more heavily, experience more negative consequences, and engage in more harmful activities, specifically drunk driving. Although surveys have documented a decline in recent years, consumption rates remain highest from late teen years to the late twenties (Johnston1-3). Despite the long-term decline since 1982 in alcohol related traffic deaths, a 4 percent increase occurred between 1994 and 1995 among young adults age 21 and over (Hingson 4). As alcohol-impaired driving persists, legal and community initiatives intervene to help reduce the problem, as well as, continuing research on possible solutions.
As a result of underage drinking, 5,000 adolescents under the age of 21 die annually due to intoxication (taking motor vehicle crashes, homicides, suicides, and other injuries while intoxicated into consideration) (paragraph 2). Later in life, underage drinkers are more likely to develop alcoholism, poor performance in school, and risky sexual behavior (paragraph 43). Although this research is not opposed to my argument, there is an importance to acknowledging it as proof of dangerous, underage drinking occurring significantly regardless of whether it is illegal. More importantly, this research stems from adolescents drinking without the supervision of adults and in uncontrolled quantities. Since adolescents must wait a long period of time to drink legally, I believe they fear they must take advantage of drinking opportunities by excess drinking and risk of safety due to their restriction to alcohol. Based on this mindset, I believe exposure to alcohol at a younger age in controlled environments would not only decrease underage drinking in large quantities, but injury and death related to intoxication, as