Alcohol as a Drug – the most widely used drug in the world. Drugs are chemicals that people put into their bodies to bring about some change in their mental or physical state. The use of alcohol can be dangerous and addictive.
In every state in the United States, teenagers cannot drink without breaking the law. Selling alcoholic beverages to people under the legal drinking age is a crime. Serving alcoholic beverages to that group is also a crime. Even parents who allow their children to serve alcoholic beverages at parties are breaking the law.
In the United States, alcohol consumption seems to be such an ordinary part of everyday life that most people do not give much thought to it – and most people end up making the decision about whether to drink without really weighing all the positives and negatives. Yet few decisions have such potentially serious consequences.
The Physical Effects of Alcohol – Alcohol is a drug, and thus, it is not digested like food. It is absorbed directly into the bloodstream through the stomach and small intestine. From there, it moves to the brain and other parts of the body. For most people, it does not take long to feel the effects of drinking even a small amount of alcohol.
Although alcohol is a depressant, in small amounts it can act like a stimulant, allowing people to feel more lively and cheerful. Many people feel more talkative or outgoing after a couple of drinks. They feel less shy and more charming. They may even feel they are thinking more clearly. In addition, other people often appear more attractive or interesting to the drinker.
However, alcohol decreases an individual's control of his or her body, thoughts, and emotions. In larger amounts, alcohol reveals its true nature as a depressant, or “downer.” Depressants slow down the functioning of the brain and central nervous system. In the process, reflexes, reactions, and responses – both the physical and mental kind – become slowed and less reliable.
Some degree of memory loss is a common side effect of alcohol use. Such loss extends all the way to blackouts, or a total loss of memory about one’s actions while under the influence of alcohol. This can be frightening because a person has no memory of what happened and is often shocked to hear what did happen through friends or acquaintances.
When too much alcohol is consumed, it causes the brain to lose more control over the body. People who have had too much to drink often exhibit symptoms such as slurred speech, loss of muscle control, and delayed reactions to what is going on around them. Some become withdrawn, overly emotional, sad, or weepy. Others proceed from jovial or boisterous behavior to aggressive or belligerent “acting out.” Long-term alcohol abuse also has serious consequences: in 2009, two separate studies found that teens with a history of binge drinking showed serious damage to the white matter in their brain, which could result in a 10 percent decline in memory and irreversible long-term memory and thinking impairment.
Consuming a very large amount of alcohol causes you to lose consciousness. When you lose consciousness, it isn’t like sleeping. You cannot be awakened easily, either through shaking or loud voices. You are not aware of your surroundings. In this vulnerable situation, it’s easy to be taken advantage of, or subjected to things you would never allow if you were conscious or awake.
Social Side-Effects – Ironically, many people drink to feel more comfortable in social situations, but in the long run, drinkers often become antisocial. In the beginning, the typical binge drinker will feel relaxed, confident, and outgoing after having a few drinks. He or she may also find a group of friends who are interested in binge drinking. For a time, it might seem as if binge drinking is a big social scene and a sure method to gaining popularity.
People enjoy the lack of inhibition that comes with drinking alcohol. They think it contributes to making friends, yet it can actually ruin friendships. Binge drinkers regularly say or do things while drinking that they regret the next day. This could be anything from having a fight with a good friend to scaring off a potential girlfriend or boyfriend.
Girls and women are more likely to be the victims of sexual assault when they are drunk. Frequent binge drinkers were found to have engaged in unplanned sexual activity more often than non-bingers. This shows how dramatically a lot of alcohol can impair your good judgment. Young women must be especially careful. Girls and women are more likely to be the victims of sexual assault when they are drunk, meaning alcohol consumption increases the risk of date rape, unplanned pregnancy, and exposure to HIV (the virus that causes AIDS) and other sexually transmitted diseases.
College students who binge drink are more likely to be in trouble with the campus police or be arrested for a whole range of reasons, including public drunkenness, fights, vandalism, and disturbing the peace. These experiences could lead to expulsion from school if they happen too often. So in the very short time that it takes to go from drinking to feel more comfortable, to drinking to get drunk, the binge drinker has changed his or her social setting dramatically. Because of their drunken actions, binge drinkers have lost friends, alienated family members, or failed to live up to responsibilities like school and work. Fortunately, through counseling, bingers can return to a full life. But recovery can start only when the binger, or someone who loves him or her, seeks help.
Does the age 21 really mean anything when it comes to drinking? Or is it just a number that the government made up? This is a great question, which can be answered by both science and law.
Science: During the first 21 years of life, the human body is in rapid development. (Development actually continues well into your 30s, but it slows down greatly during your 20s.) During these years of very rapid development, the body and its many systems are like sponges, soaking up all of the stimuli that are introduced to it. This is most visible during the toddler years, when babies learn to walk and talk and demonstrate fine motor skills (such as holding a pencil or spoon). But inside, the other parts of the body are like sponges in rapid development, too. The brain, heart, liver, muscles, vascular & nervous systems – they are all rapidly growing and developing well into your 20s. Thus, when you introduce any foreign substance, let alone a poison such as alcohol, your body is much more adversely affected than if you were an adult.
Law: In the late 1960s and early 1970s, the drinking age was lowered to 18 in some states, and the number of teens who died in car accidents in these states increased greatly. During the 1980s, when the age limit was raised back to 21, teen fatalities from car accidents in these states went way down. This was enough proof for most citizens that the legal drinking age should remain 21, and that young lives were being saved by doing so.
Why Do People Drink? With so many strong warnings about the dangers of alcohol, you may wonder why people still drink. You may wonder why it is legal, and if it is even possible to drink responsibly.
Actually, many adults over the age of 21 can drink in small quantities and maintain control. When drinking is kept to a moderate level, it can make social drinkers feel relaxed. Some people think that some types of alcohol taste good (although most of them take some getting used to). Many people think that it helps them to loosen up and have a good time, although anybody can do that without alcohol.
Most people can drink socially without becoming addicted. But if a social drinker loses that control, he or she could become an alcoholic.
Why Teens Drink – Teenagers often want to drink alcohol to appear more grown-up. Perhaps you and your friends are curious about drinking or you feel it’s required in order to fit in with the crowd. But the problems drinking can cause teenagers are probably even harder to handle than the problems adults face.
Peer Pressure – Like everyone else, teens want to fit in. They want to have friends, to feel like they belong, to be considered smart and attractive by those their own age. This very natural desire also makes them susceptible to peer pressure.
A peer is a member of the same group to which you belong. In the broadest terms, all teenagers might be considered your peers. Or you might consider your peers to be those who go to the same school as you, or live in the same neighborhood, or are part of a particular group to which you belong or want to belong. Peer pressure is the pressure felt by members of that group, or by those who want to be members, to act in a way that is accepted by the group.
For teens who are figuring out who they are by trying out many of the different kinds of adult behavior, peer pressure can be hard to resist. To go against peer pressure can mean being excluded from the group.
For teens with problems within their families, peer pressure can be even greater. Acceptance from peers may fill emotional needs that are not met at home or elsewhere. The support needed from within the family for the hard decisions that teens must make is often not available. Teens who are in situations that lead them to alcohol use often exert pressure on others to act the same way, sometimes without really intending to do so. Teens from similar backgrounds often become friends and behave in similar ways. Thus, it is easy for teens to feel that “everyone” they know drinks or uses drugs and that to choose not to do so is to be left out.
Family Problems – Problems within the family provoke some teens to turn to alcohol. Such problems include physical, emotional, or sexual abuse by a parent or other family member. One or more parents may be absent because of divorce, death, or other reasons. Parents who are not happy together can be an enormous source of tension and stress for their children. Financial difficulties, emotional strains, job demands, or their own drug or alcohol use can cause parents to become neglectful in different ways.
Such pressures within the family can lead to emotional problems for teens, such as depression or anxiety disorders. Lesser symptoms include intense feelings of loneliness, nervousness, and sadness. Often without realizing exactly what they are doing, many drug users, especially teens, use drugs and alcohol as a kind of self-medication for such problems.
Listening to Yourself – Being responsible about drinking is difficult. It involves judgment and maturity. It calls for an understanding of your body and how it reacts to alcohol. And it requires the courage to be able to say no to something – even if all your friends are doing it. This is a big job. That is why state laws require teens to wait.
Teens are often bombarded by mixed messages about alcohol. You may get warnings about its dangers at school or at home, but many different messages about alcohol come from advertising. Think of the beer commercials you have seen that make drinking look fun. The ads seem to suggest that if you drink beer, you will end up at a fabulous party on a tropical island, surrounded by beautiful people. Of course, it never happens that way in real life. But advertising sends this message to you all the time. The next time you watch those commercials, look closely at how they are trying to influence you. That will help you to make up your own mind.
It is hard to say no to friends when it comes to drinking. But standing up for who you are and what you believe in will make you a much stronger person and it will win you the respect of others.
Adapted from "Alcohol Abuse and Binge Drinking” by Holly Cefrey, Teen Health and Wellness, Rosen, 2010, http://teenhealthandwellness.com/article/36/alcohol-abuse-and-binge-drinking, and from “Alcohol” by Daniel E. Harmon, Teen Health and Wellness, Rosen, 2010, http://teenhealthandwellness.com/article/35/alcohol.