Causes And Effects Of Binge Drinking Essay, Research Paper

In many of the colleges and universities today, there are a tremendous amount of students who Drink The students who consume at least five drinks in a row at one point during a two week period are considered Binge Drinkers. Binge Drinking by college students is the cause to some of the students’ deaths, causes some students grades to fall, and is very dangerous and unhealthy.

The overwhelming amount of college students deaths caused by binge drinking has increased greatly by about 44 percent. To go along with the amount of deaths is the amount of life long injuries one may obtain from binge drinking. As David L. Marcus states, in recent newspapers, headlines are troubling. “ A 20-year-old student at Georgetown University dies in a fight after drinking. A fraternity member at the University of Michigan shoots a 19-year-old pledge with a pellet gun at a keg party. A party at Washington State University turns into a 500-student brawl.” (David L. Marcus)

These incidents that occurred were only at three universities out of hundreds. Another incident that occurred at a party at Duke was of a 20-year-old student who got drunk and died after inhaling his own vomit. All these deaths and injuries can all have been avoided if only the students had not been involved in the stupid acts of binging. In a magazine article written by Jack Hitt, he tells a story of his nephew who knew two college students that died after binging. One died after falling off a cliff and the other was from blood poisoning. Along with these two deaths came 5 other students who had been paralyzed and seriously injured in car accidents after their acts of binging. As for students not believing anything they read, I have a friend who had an encounter with binge drinking. My friend ,who will remain unnamed, was in college for only a week and decided to go out and drink with his friends that he just met. He ended up drinking so much that he passed out in the gutter. His new friends left him there for dead. He awoke in the hospital with alcohol poisoning, and he had his stomach pumped twice. Some teenagers believe that these stories are just made up to set examples of what binge drinking could do to a person. When it actually happens to someone they know, or themselves some either learn a lesson or decide to drink anyway well aware of the consequences that will come.

Binge Drinking may not effect some students with the seriousness of injury or death; However, binge drinking also leads to students missing up to 10 times the classes and to the decline in their grades. “ The Harvard researchers have found that even light binge drinkers are seven times as likely to miss classes and eight times as likely to have their grades fall.” (David L. Marcus)

According to researchers, any student who has been binge drinking, even if he or she only happens to binge drink twice a month; will show in their attendance and their grades. Students who go to parties and drink light or heavy end up getting to enjoy getting drunk. This leads to students’ binge drinking more often, thus leading to missing classes and the decline of their grades.

Binge Drinking is highly dangerous and unhealthy for students and others who are around them. Not only can binge drinking lead to death, their are unhealthy side effects that arise from binging. Drinking damages the brain, heart, and kidneys. Other effects of binge drinking are blackouts, vomiting, unwanted sex, and driving accidents. “Estimates show that underage drinking costs $58 billion a year in traffic accidents, crimes, and treatment.” (Anitra Gordon)

When a student is intoxicated it leads to them doing things they would never do when they are sober. Like unplanned sex for example. In some cases when a girl has been binge drinking and guys are around, it’s in a guy’s nature to try to get the girl to do something with them. Especially when the girl has been drinking it is easier to get something from her. With the inability to make the right decision, the girl ends up doing something very regretful. Sometimes with this unplanned sex the girl might end up pregnant, or with a sexually transmitted disease, like AIDS, or Herpes. These transmitted diseases go for guys also.

To try and help the decrease of college students binge drinking, colleges have courses on the health’s and risks of binging. Some colleges offer free videos every night showing true stories of students at parties who have been drinking and the effects of binge drinking. These videos are shown in hopes to set an example to the other students on what could happen to you if you decide to binge drink. Some colleges don’t allow drinking in dorms, fraternities or on campus at all. There are also therapists on campus for students who admit to having a problem and want to get over it. “ If someone doesn’t think they have a problem, they are unlikely to listen to the messages directed at people who have the problem.” (Henry Wechsler)

The students who don’t admit to having a problem consider themselves to be moderate drinkers. Therefore don’t go to a therapist or any classes about binge drinking. Students who do go to a therapist blame their binge drinking on academic pressures and peer pressures. Still schools are finding that there is no quick way to curb binge drinking. Florida education officials decided to crack down on drinking, but just two weeks later a drunk, unconscious fraternity member was taken to the hospital, and another was found partially clothed, tied to a tree. Though the attempts to decrease the amount of binge drinking does work in some colleges, the amount of binge drinkers increase or remain the same in other colleges. A survey of 14,000 students at 119 colleges found that the number of students abstaining from alcohol increased from 15 percent in 1993 to 19 percent last year.

The causes and effects of Binge drinking by college students involve death, serious injury, accidents, crimes, blackouts, vomiting, unwanted sex, and alcohol poisoning. Though the colleges have reduced drinking by 19 percent, the prevention of binge drinking will take a few hundred years before binge drinking by college students is down to at least 10 percent. Therefore, college students will still continue to be “binge drinkers” for quite along time.

Bibliography

Gordon, Anitra; School Library Journal; New York; May 1999.

Binge Drinking Blowout: Educating Teens About Alcohol Use.

Volume: 45 Issue: 5 Start Page: 52

Hitt, Jack; New York Times Magazine; New York; Oct. 24, 1999

The Battle of the binge. Start page: 6, 31:3

Marcus, David L.; U.S. News & World Report; Washington; 3/27/00

Drinking to get drunk Campuses still can’t purge bingeing

behavior. Special volume/issue: Vol. 128 No. 12

Start page: 53

Weber, Wim; The Lancet; London; Feb. 24, 2001

Young people’s alcohol consumption reaches alarming levels in

Europe. Volume: 357 Issue: 9256 Start page: 617

Wechsler, Henry; The Chronicle of Higher Education; Washington;

Oct. 20, 2000. Binge Drinking: Should we attack the name or

the problem? Volume: 47 Issue: 8 Start page: B12-B13