small business, Self improvement, working at home, mental health, cooking, hobbies, gardening, wellness, health, fitness, motherhood and raising families

Recent alcohol abuse statistics show that alcohol abuse among teenagers is increasing in the United States. What are some of the reasons for this? Quite a few alcoholism professionals emphasize the point that wine, beer, and liquor advertisements produced by the media are a key reason for the escalation of teen alcohol abuse.

Other alcohol abuse authorities declare that the increase in teenage alcohol abuse is due to the toleration and accessibility of alcohol in our society.

Still other chemical dependency consultants stress the point that numerous young people engage in injurious drinking due to the increased pressure that they feel.

From a slightly different vantage point, because both parents in quite a few families work full or part-time, the lack of parental guidance surely has to play a primary role in the proliferation of teenage alcohol abuse. And as a final point, various alcohol dependency authorities argue that the increase in teen alcohol abuse is due, in some way, to our lax society.

Coping Skills Education and Excessive Drinking

One component of adolescent alcohol abuse that appears to be somewhat missing in the alcoholism research findings, then again, is the nonexistence of educational courses that teach teens how to augment their coping skills so that their risky drinking behavior is drastically reduced or eradicated.

Stated more precisely, science has demonstrated that there is an indirect connection between poor coping skills and excessive drinking. In essence, this means that the poorer the coping skills, the higher the rate of alcohol abuse. To the extent that this is a valid proclamation, why isn’t coping skills education an important part of the academic prospectus in all of our junior high schools, elementary schools, and high schools?

A Society That Highlights Adolescent Coping Skills

Let us create a scenario for illustrative purposes. Let us imagine a society in which all people are trained how to develop outstanding coping skills all the way from kindergarten up to and including their senior year in high school.

In such a society, when life gets complicated, students who are ”coping skills experts” will be able to respond in a more healthy and more productive manner, as opposed to others who fail to execute their coping skills.

Stated differently, students who display solid coping skills will be more able to think clearly and demonstrate top quality decision making as opposed to students who, because they were unsuccessful in their attempts to learn first-rate coping skills, are drawn to the “quick fix” of excessive drinking.

What would happen in the above “ideal” society, moreover, if students not only got extraordinary coping skills training but also received a top shelf education that underscored the short term and long term unhealthy consequences 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 pronounced, would help students steer clear of the obvious appeal associated with teenage drinking and, for that reason, would substantially decrease the hazardous drinking behavior exhibited by adolescents in our country.

Youth Abusive Drinking: Conclusion

There are without a doubt more than a few convincing reasons why so many of our teens drink in a dangerous manner. Such a thorny subject matter demands a far-reaching and more pertinent preventative and educational response by our parents, educators, politicians, and students so that our youth can learn how to cope with life’s predicaments in a more rewarding and responsible manner rather than resorting to hazardous drinking behavior to solve their difficulties.

Tags: adolescent alcohol abuse, alcohol abuse facts, alcohol abuse statistics, teen alcohol abuse, teenage alcohol abuse, youth alcohol abuse

This entry was posted on Saturday, November 7th, 2009 at 3:50 am and is filed under Teenage Drug and Alcohol, Wellness, mental illness. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.