Alcohol On The Rise
...Boston, MA The younger people are when they start drinking alcohol, the more likely they are to drive after excessive drinking and get into alcohol-related car crashes over the course of their adult lives, according to a new study conducted at Boston University's School of Public Health.
The BU study, published this week in the Journal of Accident Analysis and Prevention, shows that adults who began drinking before age 14 are seven times more likely to report ever being in an alcohol-related motor vehicle crash than those who began drinking after age 21. In addition, adults who began drinking before age 14 are three times more likely to report driving after drinking too much than those who began after age 21. The magnitude of differences in both categories becomes smaller as the age of drinking onset approaches 21.
The study resulted from a further analysis of the recent National Longitudinal Alcohol Epidemiologic Survey, which found a strong correlation between age of first alcohol use and the prevalence of lifetime dependence. The BU study is particularly important because it looks at all people who report drinking in their lifetime, not just those who are alcohol dependent. The study also statistically controlled for the years of drinking and how often people were drunk and still found that the younger people started drinking, the more often they got into alcohol-related car crashes.
"We knew that a legal drinking age of 21 reduced alcohol-related motor vehicle crashes among drivers under 21," says Ralph Hingson, associate dean for research at BU's School of Public Health and lead author of the study. "This study shows that the potential traffic safety benefits of delaying the use of alcohol extends well beyond the age of 21. It gives us all the more reason to step up enforcement of the legal drinking age."
The BU School of Public Health's...
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