College Students Outdrink their PeersMarch 8, 2005
Research Summary
A new study concludes that college students in the U.S. consume more alcohol and are more likely to binge drink than youth of the same age who are not in school. The non-students, however, were more likely to be daily drinkers, Reuters reported March 7.
The study of 19- to 21-year-olds estimated that 18 percent of college students said they suffered from alcohol-related problems, compared to 15 percent of non-students. College students also drank more on a weekly, monthly, and yearly basis. But non-students were more likely to drink every day, a warning sign of alcohol dependence.
"Although college students suffer from some clinically significant consequences of their heavy-handed drinking, they do not appear to be at greater risk than their noncollege attending peers for the more pervasive syndrome of problems that is characteristic of alcohol dependence," wrote study author Wendy Slutske of the University of Missouri at Columbia.
The study was published in the March 2005 issue of the Archives of General Psychiatry.
Slutske, W. (2005) Alcohol Use Disorders Among US College Students and Their Non-College-Attending Peers. Archives of General Psychiatry, 62(3): 321-327.
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