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Frequent Binge Drinking Among US Adolescents

Pediatrics; ePub 2017 May 22; Jang, Patrick, et al

Publish date:: June 6, 2017

There has been a decline in frequent binge drinking (FBD) among US adolescents from 1991 to 2015, especially between 1985 and 1990; however, slower declines during the study period were observed among African American adolescents since 2007 and there was a growing gap by socioeconomic status. This according to a study that analyzed nationally representative, multicohort data from 8^th, 10^th, and 12^th grade students sampled between 1991 and 2015 from Monitoring the Future (n=1,065,022) to estimate age, period, and cohort effects on adolescents’ FBD. FBD is defined as ≥2 occasions of ≥5 drinks in a row in the past 2 weeks. Age-Period-Cohort analyses were stratified by sex, race/ethnicity, and socioeconomic status (SES). Researchers found:

Decrease in FBD during adolescence was attributable to period and cohort effects independent of age variations.
Birth cohorts between 1985 and 1990 showed the greatest decline in FBD.
The Age-Period-Cohort results were consistent across sex, race/ethnicity, and SES, with the exception of slower declines among African American adolescents compared with white adolescents since 2007.

Citation:

Jang JB, Patrick ME, Keyes KM, Hamilton AD, Schulenberg JE. Frequent binge drinking among US adolescents, 1991 to 2015. [Published online ahead of print May 22, 2017]. Pediatrics. doi:10.1542/peds.2016-4023.

Commentary:

Binge drinking remains a critical problem among adolescents. It can lead to poor school achievement, increased risky sexual behavior, and development of alcohol use disorders. Important strides have been made in addressing teen drinking and the overall prevalence of current drinking among US high school students has declined significantly from 51% in 1991 to 45% in 2007, to 33% in 2015.¹ However, among teenagers who drink alcohol, about half engage in binge drinking. While the rates of drinking and FBD have decreased, the rate of FBD is still approximately 5% among 14-year-olds and over 10% among 18-year-olds, leaving room for improvement and the opportunity to address this problem with anticipatory guidance when children are younger and direct discussion during the teenage years. —Neil Skolnik, MD

Esser MB, Clayton H, Demissie Z, Kanny D, Brewer RD. Current and binge drinking among high school students—United States, 1991–2015. MMWR Morb Mortal Wkly Rep. 2017;66:474–478. doi:10.15585/mmwr.mm6618a4.

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