| Binge Drinking on Campus
Lower in States with Fewer Adult Binge Drinkers
and Stronger Alcohol Control Laws
Study finds state where college is located
plays a significant role in heavy drinking behavior
among college students
BOSTON, MA (February 22, 2005) — Binge drinking
on college campuses, a significant public health
factor linked to deaths, injuries, rapes, assaults
and poor student performance, is significantly
lower in states where fewer adults are binge drinkers
and where laws discourage excessive consumption,
according to a new study from researchers at the
Harvard School of Public Health and the Centers
for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).
The study, which appears in the March 2005 issue
of the American Journal of Public Health, makes
it clear that college location may play a role
in determining their drinking behavior and suggests
that states can be strong partners in helping
colleges reduce binge drinking.
The rate of binge drinking among college students
was about 32 percent lower–36 percent compared
to 53 percent–in the 10 states with the lowest
rates of adult binge drinking compared to the
ten states with the highest. Furthermore, campus
binge drinking rates were 31 percent lower–33
percent compared to 48 percent–in seven states
that had four or more laws targeting high volume
sales of alcohol versus states that did not.
"What we discovered is that a student who
goes to school in a state with fewer adult binge
drinkers is less likely to be a binge drinker,"
said Toben F. Nelson of the Harvard School of
Public Health College Alcohol Study (CAS), a project
funded by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation.
"These states also tended to have well-developed
alcohol control policies. The good news is that
if more states and communities take relatively
straightforward actions–such as enacting
laws that discourage high volume sales–they
could see fewer drinking problems on college campuses
and in their broader populations as well."
Nelson and his colleagues compared binge-drinking
behavior on college campuses, as documented by
the CAS survey, to state-specific data on binge
drinking in the general population collected by
CDC as part of its Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance
System (BRFSS).
They also considered whether states had enacted
laws that specifically target high volume sales.
These laws include statutes that mandate registering
kegs, make it illegal to drive with blood alcohol
levels of .08 percent or higher, and place restrictions
on happy hours, open containers, beer sold in
pitchers, and billboards and other types of alcohol
advertising.
"We have previously found that environmental
factors such as low price, special promotions
of alcohol, and high density of alcohol outlets
near the college campus support heavier drinking
by college students. In this study we have also
focused on the pattern of drinking by adult populations
and state control laws," said Henry Wechsler,
Ph.D. a co-author of the paper and director of
college alcohol studies at The Harvard School
of Public Health.
"Most alcohol purchases and consumption
occurs off campus anyway, and so it’s not
surprising that laws and policies that seek to
limit consumption amongst the general public would
also play a role in limiting binge drinking among
college students," said Timothy S. Naimi,
M.D. of the Alcohol Team in the CDC’s National
Center for Chronic Disease Prevention and Health
Promotion. "Basically, having programs to
reduce binge drinking on college campuses in the
absence of broad-based community interventions
to do likewise may be a bit like rearranging deck
chairs on the Titanic," Naimi said.
"Overall, we recommend that states and communities
implement effective prevention strategies for
binge drinking, including increasing state alcohol
taxes, enforcing minimum legal drinking age laws,
and enforcing laws prohibiting alcohol sales to
already-intoxicated persons," said Robert
D. Brewer, M.D., a co-author of the paper and
Leader of the Alcohol Team in the CDC’s National
Center for Chronic Disease Prevention and Health
Promotion.
The pay-off in terms of lives and dollars saved
could be large.
Excessive alcohol consumption accounts for 75,000
deaths and $184 billion in economic costs in the
U.S each year. As for its effect on college students,
alcohol is a factor in the deaths of 1400 college
students each year. College students currently
spend $5.5 billion a year on alcohol, more than
they spend on textbooks, soft drinks, tea, milk,
juice and coffee combined.
The full study and additional information on
the Harvard School of Public Health College Alcohol
Study can be found at: http://www.hsph.harvard.edu/cas.
Additional information on the Centers for Disease
Control and Prevention’s activities in Alcohol
and Public Health can be found at: http://www.cdc.gov/alcohol.
The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation
based in Princeton, N.J, is the nation’s
largest philanthropy devoted exclusively to health
and health care. It concentrates its grantmaking
in four goal areas: to assure that all Americans
have access to quality health care at reasonable
cost; to improve the quality of care and support
for people with chronic health conditions; to
promote healthy communities and lifestyles; and
to reduce the personal, social and economic harm
caused by substance abuse - tobacco, alcohol and
illicit drugs. To this end, the Foundation supports
scientifically valid, peer-reviewed research on
the prevention and treatment of illegal and underage
substance use, and the effects of substance abuse
on the public's health and well-being. Further
information can be found at: www.rwjf.org.
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