Binge Drinking: the consumption of an excessive amount of alcohol in a short period of time; ten or more alcoholic beverages in a single sitting. One drink is defined as a 12-ounce can or bottle of beer, a four-ounce glass of wine, 12-ounce bottle or can of wine cooler, a mixed drink, or shot glass of the equivalent amount.
Binge drinking has become very common, especially in recent years, among high school teens. For high school seniors, it is reported that one in ten have recently engaged in extreme binge drinking. Specifically young men, students from rural areas, individuals of the white race, and teens from the Midwest are more reported for extreme binge drinking according to the Monitoring the Future Study done by the U-M Institute for Social Research.
Extreme binge drinking can put many teens at risk. For one, once teens engage in this enough, they can become accustomed to the amount of alcohol. This can lead to teens needing more to drink to feel the same effects others do at lower consumption of alcohol. It can also cause reckless driving, car accidents, and alcohol poisoning. This binge drinking can explain why hospitalizations for alcohol overdose among teens and young adults are at a high. Besides from the life threatening affects, it can also cause increased rate of blacking out, making choices one would not make when sober or even drinking less, and passing out.
A survey done in 2012 by this same group reported that one in four people ages nineteen to thirty had consumed ten drinks or more in a row. One in ten people had at least fifteen drinks in a row. Even earlier, in the 1980s, before 21 was the drinking age, more than 40% of high school seniors drank more than five drinks in a row. Binge drinking has been a problem for years and clearly in a large age range, but mainly most common in high school seniors. This is most likely due to the ignorance of teens on the dangerous affects of alcohol. Many do not realize the simple things to prevent this, such as eating before you drink, spacing drinking out, and drinking water between drinks. Binge drinking can be extremely dangerous, especially when done on a regular basis.
In my opinion, I feel binge drinking can be dangerous in all walks of life, even in college. Those high school students that come to college and have never drank before tend to take it to a whole new level, not knowing limits. Especially at a college like Penn State; we have the most hospital trips due to drugs and alcohol in the country. It makes complete sense that teens would be the individuals with the most issues with this problem, but as people become sad or angry and drink too much, it could truly happen at any age. Everyone should keep track of how much they drink and always be safe, no matter how old they are.
Sources: University of Michigan Study and ABC News Study
I have to completely agree with the prevalence of binge drinking in rural areas. I like the one person that commented earlier came from a small town. I graduated with 59 in my class, so most peoples stories that were told in school were ones that most of us experienced first hand. I know for my area we had nothing else to do but drink on the weekends because any sign of life was roughly 40 minutes in any direction. I feel like binge drinking is high is obviously a problem that should be addressed for the harm it does to a still developing brain and increased chance of alcoholism. However, I feel like kids that drink in high school can transition better to the college life where drinking is everywhere. I personally believe the drinking age should be 18 like it is pretty much everywhere else around the world. I feel high school kids binge drink because when they are able to get alcohol the feel the need to drink it all in that one night since it’s not really accepted to bring it home or put the effort of hiding it
I will be the first to admit that my drinking habits have doubled, if not trippled since college, State College to be more specific. I feel that when you’re away at college and have your own place with parties in walking distance, it’s so much easier to drink. Not to mention stress levels are sky high in college and if they’re not, you’re probably failing.
This link has a lot of interesting facts and statistics on college binge drinking:
http://pubs.niaaa.nih.gov/publications/CollegeFactSheet/CollegeFactSheet.pdf
Before I started reading this post I assumed it was about college students and as I began to read I was surprised to see it was about high school students. I was surprised because people usually associate binge drinking and alcohol poisoning with college students but I know first hand that it is just as big a problem in high school if not worse. I come from a small town (my graduating class was the largest the district has ever had and it was 130) where underage drinking is a common occurrence. Coming into school monday morning and hearing stories about so and so binge drinking, throwing up or driving home wasted over the weekend was a normal occurrence as was kids coming to school drunk. Not to mention that these kids were as young as 10th grade not just seniors. In my opinion, high school drinking is more dangerous because in college not many of us are driving places at night but driving is the only way for high school kids to get from house to house. I always knew that it was a problem at my high school but never thought much of it and this post really opened my eyes to the national problem. Here is a link to a website I found with some interesting statistics on binge drinking as well as its effects. http://www.intheknowzone.com/substance-abuse-topics/binge-drinking/long-term-effects.html
You would think binge drinking would be most common in college students possibly freshman rather than in high school seniors. I like that you chose to write on this topic because most adolescents don’t know the dangers of binge drinking. They feel that it’s fun to do with their friends and having a good to unaware of the threat it is causing to their health. I really liked how you included the proper way to drink at the end of your blog because most students don’t know about that either. Here’s a segment from the talk show The Drs on the dangers of binge drinking http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LhZj3n4ULOY
Being in college, there is obviously a lot of partying and drinking (not that I would ever do that), and therefore I’ve seen many highly intoxicated students. Seeing students and friends in such a state of mind actually scares me. I feel that PSU and Greek Life does a great job of teaching and explaining students about the dangers of alcohol and binge drinking. When I see students getting too drunk I do whatever I can to convince them to go home because I just get too nervous. I’ve heard of friends who have gotten in trouble for binge drinking in the dorms. Such students have binged drank and were so drunk that they didnt even make it out of the dorms. The RA’s found them in the bathroom and the students were written up. PSU required them to take a class about alcohol and I heard that the class really informed them. For more information about PSU and the information they give about alcohol click the link below and be aware of the repercussions. http://studentaffairs.psu.edu/conduct/policies/alcohol.shtml
I think this is a really important article for young people, both in high school and in college, to read. Students tend to view alcohol as a “harmless” drug, with little consequences other than a hangover. This is far from true. When consumed in large quantities, alcohol can have very negative effects on your body, especially your brain.
I was surprised to read that young people from rural areas are at a higher risk for binge drinking. I went to high school in a city, and many people my age were big drinkers during high school. It would be very beneficial to the health of students to be more informed about the dangers of alcohol consumption.
Here’s an article that explains how alcohol can have long-term effects on your liver and your brain.
http://pubs.niaaa.nih.gov/publications/aa63/aa63.htm
As the two comments mentioned above, I am also not too surprised at the statistics of high schoolers who partake in binge drinking. With that being said, I think that the fact that really none of us are surprised by these numbers says even more about how large of a problem binge drinking is among teenagers. There are tests that have been done that a majority of people have their first drink in high school, but do you think it would be any better for people to wait until college to drink? If you don’t like to drink in high school, good for you. But at the same time, college is a lot more different than high school and there is a lot more room for bad things to happen when you’re drinking in college. Obviously binge drinking is never a good thing, but a few drinks here and there for high schoolers may not be so bad. They’re able to experience drinking and be in a safer environment. I found an interesting article on the transition for students from high school to college. After reading it, do any of you think minimal drinking in high school is a good idea?
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2556986/
This is really frightening but I’m not surprised. The amount of ambulances on campus at night and stories of friends with alcohol poisoning is ridiculous.
I think it might be partially due to the idea that if you don’t drink you aren’t cool and if you don’t drink a lot, you’re a “lightweight”. This is so detrimental because it makes it hard to stay sober or even drink within your comfort zone and personal limits.
Penn State does a pretty good job with it though. The online classes freshman have to take about alcohol definitely taught me a bit, even though I mostly skimmed each section.
I am not surprised by your article at all. Binge drinking has become a serious problem expecially at college universities. It is absurd that teenagers can drink up to fifteen drinks. From personal experience, I have experienced many people binge drink, and it usually does not end well. http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/09/16/us-teens-drinking-idUSBRE98F0W120130916
Here is another article about binge drinking…