Parents Play Important Role in Preventing Teen Binge Drinking
A new study from Karolinska Institutet in Sweden has shown that parents who are present and engaged with their children play an important role in preventing their teens from binge drinking. Teens who smoke, stay out late with their friends, and have access to alcohol are at a greater risk of becoming binge drinkers in their late teens.
Anna-Karin Danielsson, from the Department of Public Health Sciences, said that focusing on strengthening the relationship between parent and child and limiting access to alcohol can be effective in preventing risky teen drinking. She added that parents also play an important role in teaching teens how to resist peer pressure.
In the thesis, Danielsson examined 1,200 adolescents from the age of 13 to 19 (between 2001 and 2006), investigating which factors can reduce the risk of binge drinking (protective factors) and which are risk factors. The results suggest that adolescents showing risky behavior in their early teens need early interventions because they are at a greater risk of binge drinking in the future, and also of associated problems with health, school, parents, and friends. Danielsson noted that this is when parents’ input can make a big difference.
Danielsson noted that boys and girls are slightly different, in that the risk of binge drinking among boys who smoke and have friends who drink is significantly reduced when their parents are more involved in and aware of their social lives. Girls, on the other hand, tend to benefit more from an emotionally close and stable relationship with their parents.
The thesis also looks at alcohol consumption and alcohol-related problems among adolescents in 23 European countries, and found that the UK and Nordic countries differ from other European countries in that it is as common for girls to binge drink as it is for boys. In other countries, boys report higher alcohol consumption and more alcohol-related problems than girls.
Danielsson said that 16-year-old girls in Nordic countries and the UK drink the same amount of alcohol as boys (at least five consecutive drinks in one sitting), and that this also correlates with fights, injuries, and unwanted sexual encounters. Danielsson believes that preventative measures should be directed at adolescents who are just beginning to try alcohol, but that strategies should also target adolescents with the highest consumption rates and the most alcohol-related problems.
Source: Science Daily, Parents Important for Keeping Adolescents Off Alcohol, March 7, 2011
