Youth Alcohol Abuse: A Significant Problem
Recent alcohol abuse statistics demonstrate the fact that alcohol abuse among teens is increasing in the United States. What are some of the reasons for this? Numerous alcoholism consultants believe that wine, beer, and liquor advertisements constructed by the media are a primary reason for the spread of teen alcohol abuse.
Other chemical dependency specialists assert that the increase in youth alcohol abuse is due to the toleration and ease of access of liquor, beer, and wine in our society.
Still other chemical dependency authorities declare that many of our teens get involved in dangerous drinking because of the increased stress that they experience.
From a somewhat different standpoint, due to the fact that both parents in more than a few families work full or part-time, the lack of parental guidance positively has to play a key role in the rise in teenage alcohol abuse. And as a final point, different alcohol dependency experts argue that the rise in adolescent alcohol abuse is due, at least partially, to our “anything goes” society.
Hazardous Drinking and Coping Skills Education
One facet of teenage alcohol abuse that appears to be under reported in the alcohol addiction research literature, nonetheless, is the paucity of educational courses that teach teenagers how to improve upon their coping skills so that their harmful drinking behavior is radically reduced or gotten rid of.
More precisely, science has demonstrated that there is an indirect relationship between poor coping skills and alcohol abuse. In effect, this means that the more mediocre the coping skills, the greater the occurrence of alcohol abuse. To the degree that this is a correct proclamation, why isn’t coping skills education an important part of the educational prospectus in all of our junior high schools, elementary schools, and high schools?
A Society That Stresses Adolescent Coping Skills
Let us manufacture a scenario for explanatory purposes. Let us imagine a society in which all individuals are taught how to achieve excellent coping skills all the way from kindergarten up to and including their senior year in high school.
In such a society, when life gets challenging, people who are ”coping skills experts” will be able to respond in a more healthy and more creative way, contrary to others who are unsuccessful in their attempts to put their coping skills into practice.
Stated more explicitly, students who demonstrate first-class coping skills will be more able to think clearly and demonstrate top-shelf decision making as opposed to teenagers who, because they lack top-of-the-line coping skills, gravitate to the “quick fix” of excessive drinking.
What would happen in the above “ideal” society, furthermore, if young people not only received top shelf coping skills instruction but also obtained an outstanding education that emphasized the short term and long term harmful results associated with drug abuse and alcohol abuse? Such an emphasis on drug and alcohol abuse facts, along with more advanced coping skills instruction, it is affirmed, would help teenagers steer clear of the apparent allure of underage drinking and, as a result, would radically reduce the harmful drinking behavior displayed by teenagers in our country.
Youth Alcohol Abuse: Conclusion
There are unquestionably various sound reasons why so many of our adolescents drink in a harmful manner. Such a complicated issue demands a thorough and more pertinent educational and preventative response by our students, educators, politicians, and parents so that our adolescents can learn how to cope with life’s predicaments in a more fruitful and responsible way rather than gravitating to destructive drinking behavior to solve their difficulties.
