Many teenage girls are drinking as much as boys, and college women are trying to out-drink male peers, too, Time reported in its March 2002 issue.In addition to drinking more than their counterparts, girls and young women are also getting arrested more and doing more drugs. Experts question whether the behavior is to simply feel freer or to show up guys whenever possible, including at the bar.
At Syracuse University, administrators reported that last year, twice as many women as men were rushed to the local hospital for acute intoxication. "Our women are drinking one for one with men, but they're coming in much more damaged," said Dessa Bergen-Cico, the university's associate dean of students. "We're seeing a real role shift going on here."
At the University of Vermont, the average blood-alcohol level of drunken women treated at the hospital is now .20 percent, 10 percent higher than that of intoxicated men and more than twice the legal limit of .08.
At Georgetown University, there has been a 35-percent increase in the number of women sanctioned for alcohol violations over the past three years. "Here on the front lines, we're very worried about this," said Patrick Kilcarr, director of Georgetown's Center for Personal Development. "Women are not just drinking more; they're drinking ferociously."
A recent report from the National Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse at Columbia University shows that girls as young as ninth-graders were just as likely as boys to report drinking alcohol. In 1991, 22.4 percent of 10th-grade girls and 31.4 percent of 10th-grade boys reported binge drinking. By 1999, the girls had narrowed the gender gap to within two percentage points.
"Equality is part of it," said Lee Saltz, a consultant to the prevention and intervention program in the Los Angeles public schools. "We've been working very hard to get girls to that point: Yes, you can do math. Yes, you can play football. And yes, you can drink."
Devon Jersild, a journalist who talked with college-age women for her book, "Happy Hours: Alcohol in a Woman's Life," added that women associate drinking with power and authority.
"They are no longer confined by the stereotypical notions of femininity," she said. "They associate drinking with power, and they think that if they drink like a guy, they will be like a guy."
To address the dangers of excessive drinking, some colleges are holding sessions led by young female health educators. In addition, some bars are distributing "safe-drink strips" so women can determine if their drinks have been laced with date-rape drugs.
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