College Students and Alcohol
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.”
Although high-risk drinkers are a minority in all ethnic groups, their behavior is far from a harmless “rite of passage.” In fact, drinking has pervasive consequences that compel our attention. The most serious consequence of high-risk college drinking is death. The U.S. Department of Education has evidence that at least 84 college students have died since 1996 because of alcohol poisoning or related injury—and they believe the actual total is higher because of incomplete reporting. When alcohol-related traffic crashes and off-campus injuries are taken into consideration, it is estimated that over 1,400 college students die each year from alcohol-related unintentional injuries. Additionally, over 500,000 full-time students sustain nonfatal unintentional injuries, and 600,000 are hit or assaulted by another student who has been drinking. Administrators are well aware of the burden alcohol presents to the campus environment. In addition, the 1997, 1999, and 2001 Harvard surveys found that the majority of students living in dorms and Greek residences, who do not drink excessively, still experience day-to-day problems as a result of other students’ misuse of alcohol. The prevalence of these “secondhand effects” varies across ...
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... associated harm as a sole programmatic response to student drinking. They have proven to be ineffective.
And finally, colleges and universities have to be inclusive of varied student subpopulations. They need to determine and address the special needs of groups such as racial/ethnic minorities, women, athletes, Greeks, students of different ages, and gay and lesbian students.
Initial results from programs adopting an intensive social norms approach are promising. Several institutions that persistently communicated accurate norms have experienced reductions of up to 20 percent in high-risk drinking over a relatively short time. Together these findings provide strong support for the potential impact of the social norms approach. Although any case report in this text could be challenged methodologically, the results of each study are remarkably consistent.
Nobody can control what students do, but colleges and universities can make them conscious about what is right and wrong or good and bad. This information allows students to act based on their opinions, not just drink because it is prohibited. To make students became responsible adults is the best way to combat binge drinking
Why do college students drink so much? This timeless fad has effected this generation in high percentages since the beginning of college education. Today in America it is estimated that approximately 29% of college students are regular alcohol abusers. Another recent study by the National Institute of Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism performed showed that college students suffered 1,400 deaths, 70,000 date rapes and assaults, and 500,000 injuries each year as a result of alcohol. (McDonald) Although binge drinking (5+ drinks in one sitting) is considered a normal part of the college experience many factors contribute to whether or not an individual is more prone to be an abuser.
We've all heard it before: "Too much of anything is bad for us." The amount of binge drinking occurring on American college campuses today proves that college students do not heed this warning. Binge drinking, or drinking for the purpose of getting drunk, harms both drinkers and non-drinkers alike. As today's college students come dangerously close to being swept away in the sea of papers, exams, jobs, and interviews, they use bingeing as the lifeboat that allows them to escape the stress. It allows them to forget their worries, fit in with the crowd, and live on the edge in a fast-paced world that normally does not leave time for such activities. Teetering on the brink of adulthood, yet still trapped in childhood makes drinking decisions difficult for many college students. A desire to get away from our usual lives because of societal regulations and conformity, psychological and emotional problems, and the stress of everyday life causes college binge drinking.
Binge drinkers miss class, get behind on school work, engage in unplanned sexual activity, have run-ins with police, and get injured or hurt.
In recent studies by U.S News and World Report, college campuses are turning off the tap. In other words banning alcohol entirely. One of the reasons for the banning of alcohol on campus is due to the outstanding reports of alcohol related incidents that have taken the lives of students. September of 97’, Scott Krueger, and eighteen-year-old freshman at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, died from alcohol poisoning while at a Phi Gamma Delta initiation event.(Reisberg, 1) The lack of action taken by MIT caused the students’ parents to sue them for their irresponsibility.(Reisberg, 2) Another accident that occurred due to alcohol was to a twenty-year-old Louisiana State University student named Benjamin Wynne. Wynne had apparen...
In the past few months I have learned a lot about myself. When the incident first occurred I was very angry. I know plenty of people that drink that are under age and they don’t get caught. I kept asking myself why me? At first I was hesitant to change, but the last few months have been eye opening. I have definitely used this situation to my advantage. There are so many things that I have learned about myself. I have used these last few months to really evaluate my life and set new goals for myself. I think this experience has greatly affected my life in more ways then one. I have done many things to change my life. I have seen changes in my personal life regarding my family and my friends. Many people talk about life changing experiences and how it affects them. I think that my life has changed for the good because of this incident. I’m glad that I have used this negative incident to better my life and to change the fate of my future.
The overwhelming amount of college students deaths caused by binge drinking has increased greatly by about 44 percent. To go along with the amount of deaths is the amount of life long injuries one may obtain from binge drinking. As David L. Marcus states, in recent newspapers, headlines are troubling. “ A 20-year-old student at Georgetown University dies in a fight after drinking. A fraternity member at the University of Michigan shoots a 19-year-old pledge with a pellet gun at a keg party. A party at Washington State University turns into a 500-student brawl.” (David L. Marcus)
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
It has been stated in each research source that hazing and particularly binge drinking is the most serious problem affecting social life, academic life, and health on college campuses today. The journal article pertaining to this issue, How Harvard’s College Alcohol Study Can Help Your Campus Design a Campaign Against Student Alcohol Abuse (CAS: Campus Alcohol Study for short), focuses more heavily on binge drinking and prevention than it does on the Greek system itself. The authors, Wechsler, Nelson, and Weitzman, contend that binge drinking is a nationally recognized problem but has not been studied efficiently enough to warrant effective prevention plans. The purpose of this article is to share with the public the results of a survey representing 50,000 students in 140 colleges, in 39 states. This is the first nationally representative survey of its kind and the analysis of its outcome by the authors of this article has resulted in seemingly sound prevention ideas. To begin interpreting the binge drinking phenomenon, a solid understanding of the term must be presented. Binge drinking is defined by all the articles as consuming five or more drinks in rapid succession (four or more for women) at least once in a two week period. Shockingly, the College Alcohol Study (CAS) found that two out of every five college students binge drink. The authors of this article argue that binge drinking has negative effects not only on the drinkers, but also on the entire student body. The binge drinker might get alcohol poisoning, other related physical injuries, or weakened academic performance, while the non-binging students are subjected to insults, arguments, vandalism, physical and sexual assaults, and loss of sleep due to alcohol influenced peers. The next topic that the article gets into is the different areas that change need be made to lessen the presence of binge drinking and ways in which these changes might be made. The first idea presented is that simply educating students about alcohol abuse and related problems is not effective. The CAS shows that four out of five students have been exposed to anti-alcohol education and still two out of these five binge drink, let alone drink at all. In fact, Wechsler, Nelosn, and Weitzman state that most members of predominant binge drinking groups like athletes and Greek organizations openly admit to being educated in this area. These findings display how ineffective alcohol education on college campuses is.
This is the most common form of alcohol consumption, especially in youth under the age of 21. Just within the last month there has been 85 plus alcohol related incidents, and over half involved freshman according to the University of Mississippi’s crime report. Instances such as these could have easily resulted in death, hence 1, 825 college students die each year from alcohol. Drinking is not only harmful to students bodies, but aslo academic performaces. A personal testimony came fromer freshamn here at Ole Miss stating how drinking during the begining of his collge career resulted in missing class, doing poorly on exams, and haveing a lower grade in classses overall. According to many freshman students here at the University of Mississippi, alcohol is the way to have fun at social events such as parties and other night activities on campus, the beverage itself is believed to help break the
On college campuses across America, the use of alcohol has been an topic in need of explanation for many years. The concept will be explaned with emphise on the negative effects of hooch. Alcohol in cardio-sport athletes is especially harmful. But at any rate the negative concepts apply to all student. Besides the fact that a large number of students are underage when they drink, alcohol can put students in dangerous situations and give them a headache long after the hangover is gone. The short and long term effects alcohol has can impair students physically and mentally, impacting their education and health.
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.
Weshler, Henry, and Wuethrich, Bernice. Dying to Drink: Confronting Binge Drinking on college campuses. Chicago: Rodale Inc., 2002. Print.
Although much of the alcohol abuse occurring on college campuses does cause many problems, in some areas improvements have been made, but not much within the last twenty five years. This isn’t due to the fact that campus leaders haven’t tried prevention techniques, it is the fact that the techniques that have tried to been implemented weren’t very effective. Anderson (2011) states that prevention techniques require dedication and time in order to make them work and this is something that some campus leaders lack. The techniques need...
The causes of underage drinking include peer pressure, family problems, low self-esteem, and of course curiosity. Must students who enter college in the United States are about eighteen years of age. They find a new kind of freedom on college campuses away from the supervisory eyes of their parents being away from home gives these students the freedom to make their own decisions regarding school, their finances, and their social lives. Some students feel that they finally can do what ever they want including drinking alcohol even though they perfectly know that the drinking age in many states, including Texas, is twenty-one. According to Dr. Richard Yoast, Ama’s director of the office alcohol and other drug abuse, says that 80 percent of students have consumed more than a few sips of alcohol by the time they finish high school. “Among youth 12 to 20, an estimated 10.1 million used alcohol,” he says. “Of these, 6.8million were binge drinkers and 2.1 millions were heavy drinkers.” Dr. Yoast continues to illustrate the seriousness of the ...
College, a place once populated by contemplative students, has experienced an unexpected twist over the past few years: 1,825 deaths, 599,000 injuries, 696,000 assaults, and 97,000 cases of sexual abuse (College Drinking ). These are such drastic numbers, but there is only one reason for all these corrupted acts of society: alcohol. Abusing the privileges of alcohol corrupts students’ mind, intellectually and socially.