As I was walking across campus the other day, I heard something I couldn’t believe. Somebody said, “Classes are getting in the way of college.” Stereotypically, through movies and stories, college is “supposed” to be the time where students go crazy and do inappropriate things that could lead, in the most extreme cases, to hospitalization or death. This way of thinking is absurd. According to Saltz, at least 1,400 college students die per year due to alcohol, more than 600,000 students per year are assaulted by another student who has been drinking, and more than 500,000 per year are hurt unintentionally under the influence of alcohol (2006). Current studies, however, show that it’s not just the student that is to blame. Parenting strategies have been correlated to college drinking behaviors in a very interesting way.
While it is known that peer pressure can sometimes influence students more than their own logical thinking can, it should also be known that relationships with parents have a vast impact on drinking behavior. A study done by Abar showed that of four types of parenting types and five profiles of alcohol behaviors, the parents that were in the Pro-Alcohol profile were much more likely to belong to the High Risk Drinkers or Extreme Risk Drinkers groups. The result of this study showed that the majority of students who withheld from the use of alcohol had High-Quality, High-Monitoring, or Anti-Alcohol relationships with their parents. The study also showed that a higher percentage of students who drink had a conflict with either one of their parents.
This study shows that parenting style and relationships are essential in a student’s decisions in college. Whether the student wants to admit it or not, their parents still hold weight in their lives even after they leave home.
Resources
Abar, C.C. (2011, August 15). Examining the relationship between parenting types and patterns of student alcohol-related behavior during the transition to college. Psychology of Addictive Behaviors. Advance online publication. Doi: 10.1037/a0025108
Saltz, R.F. (2006). Preventing alcohol-related problems on college campuses – Summary of the final report of the NIAAA task force on college drinking. National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism of the National Institute of Health. NIH Pub.
This was an interesting topic to consider. It surprised me that studies have been done on the direct correlation of abusive college age drinking to parent-child relationships. It seems like a common assumption that kids whose parents don't want them to drink can tend to go overboard when at college and away from parental influences. The observed direct correlation that anti-alcohol parents resulted in low-risk drinkers while parent conflict resulted in high-risk drinkers surprised me more than I would have originally considered.
ReplyDeleteIt's also interesting how the study used four parental types in conjunction with five alcohol consumption behavior patterns suggesting the variables are not definite. This seems to imply the study's results are variable to outside factors influencing alcohol behavior along with the parental types.
It would be interesting to see what outside factors they contributed to influencing each behavior type and whether or not these factors changed or remained the same between the parental types.
I also found this to be an interesting topic. I would also agree that there are most definitely outside factors influencing alcohol consumption in conjunction with parental types, such as culture perhaps.
ReplyDeleteFor example, I have noticed that that in South American countries it is not strange if an underage family member has a few drinks or ends up getting drunk with the family. As this underage family member goes off to college, (from my experience) they do not tend to drink heavily.
My experience seems to be the opposite of what this article is proposing which makes me think that somehow culture has something to do with this. In the USA, it is illegal for a minor to buy beer or even drink with family members. However in many South American countries that I have been to, never or very rarely card individuals who wan to purchase alcohol.
I'm wondering if these researchers did a study in some other region of the world, would they some up with the same results?
I found two international papers regarding adolescent alcohol use. In the Netherlands children begin drinking at a very early age – almost half of the 12-year-old population are recorded as beginning alcohol consumption at an early age and another 10% begin drinking at 12 years old. Since such early alcohol consumption puts youths at risk of developing alcohol-related problems later in life the Behavioral Science Institute of the Netherlands has proposed a home-based alcohol prevention program. The program is titled “In control: No alcohol!” and is aimed at delaying the age of alcohol use in children. The program consists of questionnaires for both mother and child, printed magazines, a factsheet brochure, and an activity book designed to air parental alcohol socialization.
ReplyDeleteIn Australia, there has also been an increase in problems due to adolescent alcohol consumption leading to the development of various parenting strategies in preventing and reducing alcohol consumption. The Youth Health Research Center at the University of Melbourne identified 457 such strategies and submitted them to a panel of experts who were asked to analyze and rate these strategies. Of the 457 only 289 were endorsed as being essential in reducing adolescent alcohol use and were then categorized. These strategies are going to be promoted and nationally recommended to the families of Australia.
While the success of these efforts may be low they do show that the young adult alcohol consumption has become a problem in other countries as well and further steps are being taken to attempt to rectify the situation.
Ryan, S., A. Jorm, C. Kelly, L. Hart, A. Morgan, and D. Lubman. “Parenting strategies for reducing adolescent alcohol use: a Delphi consensus study.” BMC Public Health. 11:13. 2011
Mares, S., H. van der Vorst, A. Lichtwarck-Aschoff, I. Schulten, J. Verdurmen, R. Otten, and R. Engels. “Effectiveness of the home-based alcohol prevention program ‘In control: no alcohol!’: study protocol of a randomized controlled trial.” BMC Public Health. 11:622. 2011.
I agree with Gaby. My first thoughts after reading this blog was that there must be other factors that play a role in alcohol abuse. Obviously, some people just don't like the taste and so don't drink. There is definitely the factor of culture. Some ethnicities such as Asians and even dogs just don't have high levels of alcohol and aldehyde dehydrogenase that is involved in alcohol metabolism. This leads to a low tolerance and a high risk of overdosing on alcohol ...be careful and don't get your dogs drunk! (Dr. Chamberlin discussed this with me a few weeks ago).
ReplyDelete