Binge Drinking Among College Students What happens behind closed doors at colleges and universities is a mystery to most people. In the United States, the most frequent thing happening behind closed doors is binge drinking. Binge drinking is the rapid consumption of alcoholic beverages and it is seen and a widespread issue among colleges. Quick consumptions of drinks can result in poisoning and death along with many more safety and health issues. College students also feel very rebellious when it comes to drinking before they are twenty-one. An effective way to reduce binge drinking and the issues involved with it such as death and drunk driving, the legal drinking age should be lowered to eighteen. Doing this would help to calm down the college population. …show more content…
The consumption of too many alcoholic beverages can result in many safety issues such as an increase in drunk drivers, drug use and inappropriate sexual behaviors. It can also result in health issues, such as becoming dependent on alcohol, internal damage and even death. According to a Binge Drinking Systematic Review, in 2012 “9.3 million individuals’ ages 12 to 20 reported drinking alcohol in the past month” (Bridges and Sharma). There has also been research comparing college students and non-colleges students and the research showed college students are actually more involved with drinking than the non-college students. Binge drinking can be very dangerous and should be
Getting Serious About Eradicating Binge Drinking is an informative article by Henry Wechsler. Wechsler has worked with the College Alcohol study since its creation in 1992, and he also lectures at the School of Public Health at Harvard. In his article, Weschler discusses the prominent trend of binge drinking on college campuses and how to solve the widespread problem. Binge drinking is a term used to describe the act drinking alcoholic beverages with the intention of becoming intoxicated over a short period of time.
College student drunkenness is far from new and neither are college and university efforts to control it. What is new, however, is the potential to make real progress on this age-old problem based on scientific research results. New research-based information about the consequences of high-risk college drinking and how to reduce it can empower colleges and universities, communities, and other interested organizations to take effective action. Hazardous drinking among college students is a widespread problem that occurs on campuses of all sizes and geographic locations. A recent survey of college students conducted by the Harvard University School of Public Health reported that 44 percent of respondents had drunk more than five drinks (four for women) consecutively in the previous two weeks. About 23 percent had had three or more such episodes during that time. The causes of this problem are the fact that students are living by themselves no longer with parents or guardians; they earn their own money; students need to be a part of a group, be accepted; and they have the wrong idea that to feel drunk is “cool.”
The legal drinking age in the United States will always be a point of contention. No one can settle upon a drinking age that everyone is in agreement with; should it be 18 or 21? Ages 18 and 21 are the most popular options, yet neither one has 100% of the vote. With the current legal drinking age in America standing at 21, meaning that people under the age of 21 cannot purchase or consume alcoholic food or beverages, there is the question of whether or not to lower it to 18 or 19 years old. This paper will argue that the drinking age should be lowered, and examine its impact on State University.
Many temptations are faced in college culture and one of them is underage drinking and driving. Underage drinking and driving has essentially become an epidemic, rapidly developing among today’s youth. College culture has come to encourage drinking and driving through the places and people that surround the students (National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism, October 2002). Some people don’t see underage drinking as an issue, when in fact it is a huge issue that every teenager will face. Since underage drinking is illegal people want to rebel by drinking; additionally, alcohol is really easy to get ahold of in college. Since many students are going to drink, the first line of defense is to educate students about the effects of alcohol and what can happen if students do drink and drive. Unless we are able to put a stop to underage drinking and driving through education, and a system called smart start the problem wont get any better.
College life is filled with changes. It is filled with many new experiences. As college students, we are on our own, adults. As adults we are responsible for keeping up to date on information that affects us. One issue that affects college students nation wide is drinking. The current legal drinking age in the United States is twenty-one years of age. The Federal government raised the legal drinking age from 18 to 21 in 1984. Even with the current drinking age at twenty-one, many people under that age choose to drink anyway. In fact, a government survey from 1996 showed that 56% of high school seniors reported drinking in the last 30 days (Hanson). With so many underage drinkers, many people believe that the drinking age should be lowered, stating that people are going to drink, regardless of the legal age. Still others see the high number of underage drinkers as a sign that the legal age needs to stay where it is and stricter laws need to be implemented. With the extremely high number of underage drinking, we can assume that the current drinking age is relatively ineffective, and therefore we must ask ourselves: should the drinking age be lowered, or should we revise policies to make the current age more effective? It is important to view all sides of the issue before deciding which side to be on. We must look responsibly at the issue instead of saying that the drinking age should be lowered, simply because we are under 21. The current drinking age has many debatable sides, or approaches which need to be examined. Those approaches include lowering the drinking age because the current policies don?t work, lowering the drinking age because it would lead to more responsible drinking, kee...
We all know what it is like to wake up in the morning, with our head aching, and our body feeling like it was just hit by a train. College students world wide know this feeling. These are the results of binge drinking. The question of why college students continue to submit themselves to alcohol is unknown. While many reasons are given, the cause generally falls into one of three categories, peer pressure, insecurity, or to help solve there problems. But the one thing students don’t realize are the consequences and effects that binge drinking can have, health and social problems are just a few.
College students are often classified as “party animals,” but these students are most under the legal drinking age when starting college. Students are drinking under the legal age; therefore, they must accept the adult consequences for trying to take adult actions. Lowering the drinking age would show how easily our government is persuaded to choose a side in controversial issues. If the drinking age was lowered, student’s grades would start to drop and the student’s drop-out rate would rise tremendously. Students in this generation have plenty of distractions that take them away from fully focusing on school; therefore, if the age was lowered, students would only worry about the next party instead of their next class. Also, excessive amounts of alcohol have been proven to kill vital brain cells, and brain cells do not replicate like other cells within the body. The brain is not fully developed until age twenty-one, so an eighteen year old should not be killing brain cells necessary for everyday communication and decision making. In order for students to excel, they need minimal stress and minimal distractions. Alcohol will only increase stress and increase distractions, so students should refrain from any type of alcohol related activity. Keeping the drinking age at age twenty-one will result in more successful, responsible
According to a national survey conducted by the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism, “almost 60 percent of college students ages 18–22 drank alcohol in the past month, 1 and almost 2 out of 3 of them engaged in binge drinking during that same timeframe” (NIH). Binge drinking culture refers to the recent rise and normalization of college age students drinking excessively. The CDC describes binge drinking as “a pattern of drinking that brings a person’s blood alcohol level to 0.08grams within two hours” (CDC). For many young adults, college is one of the first times they will experience complete freedom. This freedom often leads to partying, which goes hand in hand with the consumption of alcohol. However, since the age at which
Binge or excessive drinking is the most serious problem affecting social life, health, and education on college campuses today. Binge or excessive drinking by college students has become a social phenomena in which college students do not acknowledge the health risks that are involved with their excessive drinking habits. Furthermore college students do not know enough about alcohol in general and what exactly it does to the body or they do not pay attention to the information given to them. There needs to be a complete saturation on the campus and surrounding areas, including businesses and the media, expressing how excessive drinking is not attractive and not socially accepted.
Binge Drinking is an intriguing phenomenon that many college students take part in all across the country. The issue of binge drinking has been a problem on college campuses for decades. Binge drinking has many horrible effects, but the problem starts with the causes for it. If the causes could be controlled then the issue would not get out of hand. Many college students give different causes for their drinking problems, and experts on the subject have their explanations as well. The problem is, while growing through adolescence anything can become an excuse for drinking, such as ¡§its Thursday the day before Friday, we need to drink¡¨ or, ¡§it¡¦s the last Wednesday of the semester, lets get some beer.¡¨
Alcohol has been in the world for many centuries and has become a pain but also somewhat of a solution to society. It can be viewed as something to be a social gathering that brings friends together or it can be taking as destruction to someone. Over the years alcohol has played many roles in the world but it plays an even bigger role in substance abuse. Doctors have made several points that it is okay to have a drink every now and again but people need to realize when one drink has become too many. The ideal of having a drink with friends or going out and having an occasional drink is acceptable; However, is it still acceptable when a person find their selves having a drink first thing in the morning or runs to a drink to solve their people.
There are a number of reasons why teenagers feel the urge to drink. Social environment, peer influence, stresses, and even factors such as media influence contribute to underage drinking. Peer pressure is as well known use among teens. Americans have a burning desire to be accepted and liked by their peers. Everyone wants to feel a sense of belonging. Many adolescents feel that they need to drink alcohol to gain this acceptance by the others around them. Stress is also another reason why teens may feel apt to drink alcohol. Stress causes teenagers to look for a quick escape from the problems, which they face, in their day-to-day lives. This quick escape can be found in the shape of a bottle. In the eyes of an underage drinker, alcohol is the cure to all problems, a way to forget all of stress and pressures that are facing them. They feel that it will numb their pain and continuing to use alcohol will result in maybe another problem, substance abuse.
As the current legal drinking age remains to be 21, adolescents today are increasingly drinking large amounts of alcohol behind the backs of others. Along with this being illegal, alcohol-related dangers within our youth like dependency, disease, and irresponsible behaviors are problems that many are finding ways to prevent by increasing awareness; some people have even suggested that raising the drinking age would be the ultimate solution. However, is the constant routine of warning adolescents and preventing them from drinking really working? Based on the vast number of anti-alcohol programs in schools and existing laws forbidding the use of underaged drinking, today, there are still increasing reports. Instead of repeatedly preventing our
Drug abuse has been a hot topic for our society due to how stimulants interfere with health, prosperity, and the lives of others in all nations. All drugs have the potential to be misapplied, whether obtained by prescription, over the counter, or illegally. Drug abuse is a despicable disease that affects many helpless people. Majority of those who are beset with this disease go untreated due to health insurance companies who neglect and discriminate this issue. As an outcome of missed opportunities of treatments, abusers become homeless, very ill, or even worst, death.
The problem of alcohol use is very relevant nowadays. Today alcohol consumption characterized by vast numbers in the world. All of society is suffering from this, but primarily jeopardized the younger generation: children, teenagers, young people, and the health of future mothers. Because alcohol is particularly active effect on the body that are not formed, gradually destroying it. The harm of alcohol abuse is evident. It is proved that when alcohol is ingested inside the body, it is carried by blood to all organs and has harmful effect on them until destruction. Systematic use of alcohol develops a dangerous disease such as alcoholism. Alcoholism is dangerous to human health, but it is curable as other diseases. The big problem is that most of the alcohol products which are made in private places contain many toxic substances, defective products often leads to poisoning and even death. All this has negative impact on society and its cultural values.