Study Connects Binge Drinking to Advertising

Advertising effectively promotes alcohol brands to teens, researchers from Dartmouth Medical School and the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health found in a study published in this month’s issue of the Archives of Pediatrics and Adolescent Medicine.

Dartmouth pediatricians Susanne Tanski, Auden McClure and James Sargent found a correlation between alcohol companies’ annual advertising expenditures and underage drinkers’ preferred brands in the study “Alcohol Brand Preference and Binge Drinking among Adolescents.”

The researchers also found that respondents who said they had a favorite brand were significantly more likely to report having engaged in binge drinking than those who did not specify a favorite. “

Youths chose distilled spirit brands in large numbers, brands preferred by youth have tended to have high advertising expenditures, and choosing a favorite brand was associated with binge drinking,” the researchers concluded.

“The important take-home message is that kids who said they have a favorite brand were far more likely to binge drink,” Tanski said in a Dartmouth news release.

Two-thirds of those surveyed said they had a favorite brand of alcohol, with Smirnoff and Budweiser leading as the first and second favorite brands among women, respectively, and Budweiser and Smirnoff as the first and second favorite brands among men.

The correlation between binge drinking and brand favoritism “suggests that the ‘drink responsibly’ message is being swamped by other advertising messages that associate alcohol brands with partying and drinking to excess,” Tanski said, citing a recent Captain Morgan rum commercial as an example.

Future studies will also measure brand consumption, according to David Jernigan, an author of the study and associate professor at the Bloomberg School. He told The Dartmouth that half of the respondents chose a distilled spirits brand as their drink of choice.

"A Time for Action: Preventing Underage Drinking in West Virginia"

"A Time for Action: Preventing Underage Drinking in West Virginia"

With production support provided through the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration's (SAMHSA) Center for Substance Abuse Prevention (CSAP), the following States and Territories have created videos that highlight their local challenges and successes in preventing underage drinking. CSAP will be providing video production support to additional States and Territories during the next 3 years. You can view completed videos by clicking on the links below or by visiting this SAMHSA YouTube page. See the audience and messagematrix at the end of the video list to help select videos of particular interest.

Click here to watch "A Time for Action: Preventing Underage Drinking in West Virginia."

Alaska
Underage Drinking Prevention in Alaska: A Collective Responsibility (WMV - 16:45 min)
Arkansas
Underage Drinking Prevention in Arkansas (WMV - 8:44 min)
Colorado #1
Underage Drinking: It's an Adult Problem (WMV - 2:00 min)
Colorado #2
Underage Drinking: It's an Adult Problem (WMV - 3:04 min)
Colorado #3
Underage Drinking: It's an Adult Problem (WMV - 2:29 min)
Connecticut
Connecticut and Underage Drinking: Partnering for Prevention (WMV - 9:03 min)
Delaware
Time to Re-Think Teens and Drink© (WMV - 6:36 min)
Florida
Building a Wall Between Teens and Alcohol (WMV - 5:00 min)
Georgia
Taking Action on Preventing Underage Drinking in Georgia (WMV - 7:20 min)
Guam
Fan Mak Måta (Wake Up!): Underage Drinking is a MAJOR Minor Problem (WMV - 13:25 min)
Iowa
Time for Action: Preventing Underage Drinking in Iowa (WMV - 12:39 min)
Kentucky
Kentucky’s Parents & Youths: Partners in Preventing Underage Drinking (WMV - 7:40 min)
Louisiana
Underage Drinking Prevention in Louisiana (WMV - 12:35 min)
Mississippi
Underage Drinking Prevention in Mississippi: A Collective Perspective (WMV - 12:26 min)
Missouri
Prevention of Underage Drinking in Missouri (WMV - 5:12 min)
Montana
Keep Talking, Montana: You Can Prevent Underage Drinking (WMV - 10:40 min)
Nebraska
The Power of Prevention: Nebraska Communities Take Action (WMV - 10:35 min)
New York
Underage Drinking Prevention: Taking Action in New York (WMV - 15:40 min)
Oklahoma (Video #1 — Youth)
Underage Drinking: What a Waste (WMV - 5:43 min)
Oklahoma (Video #2 — Adults)
Underage Drinking: What You Can Do (WMV - 9:09 min)
Texas
Underage Drinking: A Problem as Big as Texas (WMV - 16:42 min)
Utah
Preventing Underage Alcohol Use in Utah: Statewide Collaboration, Local Action (WMV - 11:38 min)
Vermont
Prevention Works, When we work together (WMV - 10:22 min)
Virgin Islands (Video #1)
It's Our Responsibility: Talking With Your Kids About Alcohol (WMV - 6:12 min)
Virgin Islands (Video #2)
the courage to Say "No": Teens in the Territory Wait Until the Legal Age to Drink (WMV - 4:21 min)
Washington
Underage Drinking in Washington: Something to Talk About (WMV - 8:12 min)
West Virginia
A Time for Action: Preventing Underage Drinking in West Virginia (WMV - 14:35 min)
Wyoming
Underage Drinking Prevention in Wyoming: a Call To Action (WMV - 10:12 min)

Study Shows Drugged Driving is Prevalent

USA Today reports that drivers who die in crashes test positive for drugs 25 percent of the time, a new study finds.

Researchers examined data on more than 44,000 drivers in single-vehicle crashes who died between 1999 and 2009. They found that 24.9 percent tested positive for drugs and 37 percent had blood-alcohol levels in excess of 0.08, the legal limit. Fifty-eight percent had no alcohol in their systems; 5 percent had less than 0.08.

Study co-authors Eduardo Romano and Robert Voas of the Pacific Institute for Research and Evaluation in Calverton, Md., told the paper that their study is one of the first to show the prevalence of drug use among fatally injured drivers. Among drivers who tested positive for drugs, 22 percent were positive for marijuana, 22 percent for stimulants and 9 percent for narcotics.

CASA Calls Teen Substance Use America's No. 1 Problem

This week the National Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse at Columbia University released a report calling teen substance use the worst public health problem in America.

CASA’s national study declares teen smoking, drinking, misusing prescription drugs and using illegal drugs a public health problem of epidemic proportions. The report reviews current knowledge of the science of addiction as a complex brain disease with origins in adolescence, documents how adolescence is the critical period for the initiation of substance use, and reveals the enormous and costly health and social consequences of teen substance use.

The study looks at how American culture increases the risk that teens will use addictive substances and how the messages sent by adults, and glamorized by the tobacco and alcohol industries and the media, normalize substance use and undermine the health and futures of our teens.

Highlights from the report include:

•90 percent of Americans who meet the medical criteria for addiction started smoking, drinking, or using other drugs before age 18.

•1 in 4 Americans who began using any addictive substance before age 18 developed an addiction, compared to 1 in 25 Americans who started using at age 21 or older.

•75 percent of all high school students have used addictive substances including tobacco, alcohol, marijuana or cocaine; 1 in 5 of them meets the medical criteria for addiction.

•46 percent of all high school students currently use addictive substances; 1 in 3 of them meets the medical criteria for addiction.

“The problem is not that we don’t know what to do, it’s that we are failing to act. It is time to recognize teen substance use as a preventable public health problem and addiction as a treatable medical disease, and to respond to it as fiercely as we would to any other public health epidemic threatening the safety of our children,” Susan Foster, CASA’s Vice President and Director of Policy Research and Analysis said in a news release.