Alcohol - Underage Drinking

By Jerry Price - Mar 13, 2006 -

  • Alcohol use was stable in 2004 at 11 percent among 8th-graders, 22 percent among 10th-graders, and 29 percent among 12th-graders.
  • Long-term trends for high school seniors indicate a peak in 1981, when 41 percent reported heavy drinking. Over the next 12 years, the percentage of high school seniors reporting heavy drinking declined gradually to a low of 28 percent in 1993. Since 1993, the prevalence of this behavior has held fairly steady.
  • Among 12th-graders, males were more likely to drink heavily than were females. In 2004, 34 percent of 12th-grade males reported heavy drinking, compared with 24 percent of 12th-grade females.
  • Among 10th-graders, a gender difference in heavy drinking was found in earlier years (e.g., 29 percent for males versus 21 percent for females in 2001), but a sharp decline in drinking among males brought the rates closer in 2004 (24 percent for males versus 20 percent for females). However, the differences in drinking behaviors of males and females continues to be more pronounced among older adolescents.

Behavior and Social Environment Indicators: Alcohol Use America’s Children: Key National Indicators of Well-Being, 2005, (Federal Interagency Forum on Child and Family Statistics) [Accessed October 31, 2005]

“According to the poll, 30 percent of U.S. teens say they “have occasion to use alcoholic beverages,” while 70 percent say they do not. The data reveal some interesting differences according to age and gender.

“As age increases in the teen years, so does the likelihood of alcohol consumption. In the 2003 survey, 42 percent of teens aged 16 to 17 report using alcohol, compared to just 22 percent of teens aged 13 to 15. The significant increase among older teens may reflect increased peer pressure within this age group to drink.

“The stereotype that teen boys are wilder and more likely to drink than teen girls is not borne out in these data; in fact, teen girls are somewhat more likely than teen boys to say they drink (33 percent to 26 percent, respectively). This statistic has significant health consequences, as the Leadership to Keep Children Alcohol Free reports that girls aged 12 to 16 who drink are six times more likely than girls who don’t drink to suffer from depression.”

One in Three U.S. Teens Admits Drinking Alcohol (Gallup Poll), April 1, 2003 [Subscription required] Note: the 2004 survey showed similar findings

In a report entitled “Graduated Driver Licensing and Drinking Among Young Drivers,” the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration found that teenage drivers in states with “restrictive driver-licensing laws are less likely to drink and drive than teens in states with more relaxed licensing laws.”

The survey measured the responses of 75,000 youths between the ages of 15 and 17. In states with more restrictive laws, 8.5 percent of the teenage drivers reported driving under the influence, while 11.5 percent reported driving under the influence in states with less restrictive laws.

The report also found that “from 1999 to 2001, 21 percent of drivers ages 15 to 17 described themselves as binge drinkers, and six said they were heavy drinkers.”

“Binge drinking is defined as consuming five or more drinks on the same occasion, either at the same time or within a couple of hours of each other, or on at least one day in the past month.

“Heavy alcohol use is defined as consuming five or more drinks on the same occasion on five or more days during the past 30 days. All heavy drinkers are also binge drinkers.”

Joyce Howard Price, “Teen Driving Rules Tied to Rates of Sobriety,” http://www.washingtontimes.com , May 3, 2004 [Requires access fee]

The James B. Beam Distilling Company, maker of Jim Beam whiskey, is partnering with Starbucks Coffee to create a coffee liqueur that will be sold through licensed alcohol retailers like Kahlua and Bailey’s Irish cream. These products are especially attractive to the younger set.

Thumbs Down (Marin Institute)[Accessed November 1, 2005]

Anhueser-Busch has introduced a new product that will appeal to a younger market-B-to-the-E (BE). The product—beer infused with caffeine, guarana and ginseng—is designed to appeal to the “cocktail culture crowd,” a market segment that favors a wide variety of flavors and colors of mixed drinks.

Product Alert (Marin Institute) [Accessed November 1, 2005]

  • As of 1988, all states prohibit the purchase of alcohol by youth under the age of 21 years. Consequently, underage drinking is defined as consuming alcohol prior to the minimum legal drinking age of 21 years.
  • In 2003, 44.9 percent of 9th through 12th graders reported drinking alcohol on one or more of the past 30 days; prevalence of current drinking was higher for females (45.8 percent) than among males (43.8 percent) (CDC, YRBS, 2003).
  • Zero tolerance laws, which make it illegal for youth under age 21 years to drive with any measurable amount of alcohol in their system (i.e., with a blood alcohol concentration (BAC) greater than or equal to 0.02 g/dL), have reduced traffic fatalities among 18 to 20 year olds by 13 percent and saved an estimated 21,887 lives from 1975 through 2002 (NHTSA, 1997).

General Alcohol Information: Underage Drinking (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention) [Accessed October 31, 2005]

The Cost of Underage Drinking
Violent Crime$29,368,000,000
Traffic Crashes$19,452,000,000
Burns$189,000,000
Drownings$426,000,000
Suicide Attempts$1,512,000,000
Fetal Alcohol Syndrome$493,000,000
Alcohol Poisonings$340,000,000
Treatment$1,008,000,000
TOTAL$52,788,000,000

Economic Costs of Underage Drinking (Marin Institute) [Accessed October 31, 2005]

Each day, seven thousand children in the United States under the age of 16 take their first drink. What are the ramifications?

  • Persons who first drank alcohol before age 15 were more than five times as likely to report alcohol dependence or abuse in the past year than were persons who first drank at age 21 or older. Specifically, 16 percent of those who began drinking alcohol before age 12 reported alcohol dependence or abuse in the past year, as did 15.5 percent of those who began between ages 12 and 14. In contrast, 2.6 percent of persons who reported alcohol dependence or abuse started drinking at 21 or older.
  • Almost 74 percent of persons age 21 or older reported that they started drinking alcohol before age 21. Of these, 4 percent reported first drinking before age 12, 14 percent between ages 12 and 14, 33 percent between ages 15 and 17, and 22 percent between ages 18 and 20.
  • 65 percent of 8th-graders and 84 percent of 10th-graders believe that alcohol is readily available to them for consumption.
    Almost 20 percent of 8th-graders, and 42 percent of 10th-graders have been drunk at least once.
  • Ninth-grade girls now report consuming more alcohol than do ninth-grade boys: 38.5 percent of girls and 33.9 percent of boys reported drinking in the past month, and 20.9 percent of girls and 18.8 percent of boys reported binge drinking.4 In 2001, girls reported consuming alcohol at rates less than or nearly equal to boys.
  • 36.4 percent of ninth-grade students reported having consumed alcohol before they were age 13. In contrast, only 19.3 percent of ninth-graders reported having smoked cigarettes, and 11.7 percent reported having used marijuana before they were age 13.
  • Rates of drinking differ among racial and ethnic minority groups. Among students in grades 9 to 12, 32 percent of non-Hispanic white students, 15 percent of African American students, and 29 percent of Hispanic students reported binge drinking.
  • A study of 5th-through 11th-grade students found that those who are exposed to and enjoy alcohol advertisements have more favorable beliefs about drinking and say they are more likely to drink in the future and consume more alcohol.

How Does Alcohol Affect the World of a Child? (Alcohol Free Children) [Accessed November 1, 2005]

Further Learning

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