Teenage Alcohol Abuse: A Crucial Problem

Alcohol abuse statistics demonstrate the fact that alcohol abuse among adolescents is increasing in the United States. What are some of the reasons for this? More than a few alcohol abuse specialists declare that beer, wine, and liquor ads brought into being by the media are a key reason for the expansion of teen alcohol abuse.

Other chemical dependency consultants claim that the increase in teenage alcohol abuse is due to the acceptability and convenience of liquor, beer, and wine in our society.

Still other alcoholism experts state that quite a few of our adolescents involve themselves in harmful drinking because of the increased pressure that they live through.

From a slightly different point of view, since both parents in quite a few families work, the lack of parental supervision clearly has to play a primary role in the proliferation of adolescent alcohol abuse. And last of all, diverse alcohol abuse authorities emphasize the point that the proliferation of adolescent alcohol abuse is due, in part, to our lax society.

Hazardous Drinking and Coping Skills

One aspect of teenage alcohol abuse that seems to be deficient in the alcohol abuse research results, conversely, is the paucity of educational programs that teach teenagers how to augment their coping skills so that their dangerous drinking behavior is radically reduced or eliminated.

Stated another way, science has uncovered the fact that there is an indirect association between poor coping skills and abusive drinking. Fundamentally, this means that the more mediocre the coping skills, the greater the frequency of alcohol abuse. To the extent that this is a valid assertion, why isn’t coping skills education a fundamental part of the academic curriculum in all of our high schools, junior high schools, and elementary schools?

A Society That Puts Emphasis On Teenage Coping Skills

Let us construct a scenario for the purpose of explanation. Let us imagine a society in which students are taught how to achieve first-class coping skills all the way from kindergarten up to and including their final year in high school.

In such a society, when life gets challenging, individuals who are “coping skills masters” will be able to respond in a healthier and more successful manner, as opposed to others who are unsuccessful in their attempts to execute their coping skills.

Stated another way, students who reveal superior coping skills will be more able to think proactively and display top quality decision making as opposed to teenagers who, because they are deficient in outstanding coping skills, gravitate to the “quick fix” of excessive drinking.

What would happen in the above “ideal” society, what’s more, if adolescents not only got excellent coping skills education but also obtained a first class education that stressed the long term and short term devastating costs associated with drug abuse and alcohol abuse? Emphasizing these kinds of drug and alcohol abuse facts, along with more highly developed coping skills training, it is emphasized, would help teens steer clear of the apparent appeal associated with underage drinking and, consequently, would substantially lessen the injurious drinking behavior demonstrated by the youth in our country.

Adolescent Risky Drinking: Conclusion

There are certainly various compelling reasons why so many of our teens abuse alcohol. Such a knotty problem demands a wide-ranging and more applicable educational and preventative response by our students, parents, politicians, and educators so that our youth can learn how to cope with life’s problems in a more productive and responsible way rather than gravitating to hazardous drinking behavior to solve their problems.