What We Need To Know About Teens and Drinking

Dispelling Myths According to Research

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This week on Raising Good Humans Podcast, I spoke with Professor Rob Turrisi, director of the ProHealth Lab at Penn State. Dr. Turrisi’s research focuses on the application of behavioral decision-making to prevent drinking, to prevent drunk-driving, and to prevent alcohol abuse. Today, I am digging into the myths and facts about alcohol use among young people.

Myth 1: Alcohol disorders are not a major concern for young people

Fact 1: The number of college students who have an alcohol disorder exceeds the population of some major US cities.

If we added up all the seniors that are graduating right now, there would be about 250,000 of them that are leaving college with an alcohol disorder that did not show up with one. If we look at that over a four to five year period, that's a larger population than some major US cities.

Professor Rob Turrisi

Many parents overlook the dangers facing young people around alcohol. Whether it is our attempt to be friends with our child, to be “cool,” or our own behavior and thinking around alcohol norms, many parents do not take the issue of alcohol misuse seriously in young people. We are more likely to minimize alcohol experimentation, to assume that our children are capable of handling routine peer pressure, and to place undue faith on them learning lessons from their own behavior (more on that below).

Instead, Professor Turrisi’s research shows us that a lot of college drinking is essentially OUT OF HAND for many of our young people, and that starting early with conversations and monitoring in adolescence is an important step in delaying and reducing eventual alcohol misuse.

Myth 2: Early moderate drinking experience is protective of future binge drinking

Fact 2: Exposure to alcohol in High School does NOT help to prevent misuse in college.

According to research, non-drinkers in High School tend to become “light drinkers” in college. They will drink on weekends but they will try not to get drunk. Kids getting drunk occasionally in High School become “heavy episodic drinkers” in college. They get really drunk on weekends. Kids that drink a lot in High School become “high intensity” drinkers in college. They will be more likely to experience a high incidence of blackouts.

Professor Rob Turrisi

This myth is prevalent in our society. We have the notion that if kids learn to drink in moderation while living with us and under our supervision, they will be better off in college when they have increased independence. However, the data has NEVER shown this to be true. Research from around the world fails to show any benefit to starting to drink earlier, but instead shows that early drinkers go on to drink more later in their lives, and are more likely to experience the harsh consequences of alcohol abuse. Professor Turrisi’s research shows that when parents let their kids drink at an early age, those kids are actually more likely to show signs and symptoms of alcohol-use disorder as young as 19 or 20. It also shows that whatever a student's high watermark is in the fall semester of their first year, stays that way through four years of college. This suggests that unless we do something to disrupt the pattern, it is not likely to change.

Myth 3: Blackouts are pass outs

Fact 3: Blackouts are a sign the body is shifting resources.

In a recent study in spring 2023, 80 participants were asked to wear a band to monitor their alcohol intake. Of those participants, they had a blackout one out of every 3 nights drinking.

Professor Rob Turrisi

When we think about blackouts, we often picture a student passed out at the table at a party, or perhaps asleep on the floor of their dorm room. In fact, during blackouts the person is “awake,” and may even appear totally alert, but their brain has shifted resources so that they are no longer forming memories. The brain is working so hard on breathing and heart rate, focused on survival, and therefore shutting off the function of memory. Though this is a terrifying description, it is an important explanation to have at the ready to discuss with your adolescents

We also know that the younger people start drinking, the more likely they are to have blackouts during college. And the hits keep on coming. The more blackouts a young person has, the more likely they are to experience consequences associated with drinking, and to have more severe consequences as well.

Myth 4: Kids are learning from negative experiences with alcohol

Fact 4: The average kid walking around a college campus has an average of 100 negative consequences of social drinking.

Even though we now know that students are experiencing consequences, serious ones like waking up in a place you don’t recognize, arrests or assaults, we don’t see a consistent pattern of kids learning lessons for behavior change.

Professor Rob Turrisi

While many of us (myself included) believe in the concept of natural consequences - those that come as a result of our child’s choices that help them to learn how to adjust in the future - when it comes to consequences resulting from alcohol use, the numbers are staggering. If the average college student is having 100 negative consequences, the stakes are already too high. As such, we have to shift our thinking around learning through experience, and instead work to prevent some of the consequences earlier on. This correlates to what parents can do (see that article coming soon) to influence the outcomes while our children are still under our care.

Myth 5: They do things right in Europe

Fact 5: Things are not better in Europe.

Europe is not without problems. The number of kids with early age of onset [of drinking disorders] is higher than the US, as is the number of those with lifetime alcohol problems.

Professor Rob Turrisi

We have all heard the comparisons of US drinking to the ideal setting in Europe. We love to watch children drinking fine wine in France, and think that they have figured out something we haven’t. Research shows that this just simply is not true. European drinking starts earlier than in the US (with the notable exception of Turkey, a Muslim country), and results in a higher number of young people with alcohol disorders. There is no magic happening in Europe, and parents’ attitudes towards early drinking (and a lower drinking age) does NOT appear at all protective in the data.

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