What's Your SPF?

What's your SPF?

Think that you know the facts about teens and alcohol? See how you do on our SPF (student protective factor) Quiz.

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How to boost your SPF

Learn to Boost your SPF and explore your role in underage drinking

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How to boost your SPF

Explore Your Role in Underage Drinking

First it is important to note that during adolescence, youth begin to take risks and test limits.

They do so because they are moving from a family-centered world to the larger community, within which they will begin to define their own identity. It is also during this time that parents have an especially important role in preventing and addressing underage drinking.

General Parenting Skills

  • Parents who communicated and were involved with their children at ages 10 and 11, set clear expectations for their children's behavior, practiced good supervision and consistent discipline, and minimized conflict in the family had children who, at ages 11 and 12, were more likely to see alcohol use as harmful and less likely to initiate alcohol use early. They were also less likely to misuse alcohol at ages 17 to 18.1


  • Lack of parental support, monitoring, and communication and lack of feeling close to their parents have been significantly related to frequency of drinking, heavy drinking, and drunkenness among adolescents.2


  • Studies have shown that a positive relationship between parents and adolescents can serve as a protective factor, offsetting the risk of alcohol use associated with peer alcohol use.3

Todays Social Influences

  • Family and peers can influence drinking behavior actively, by explicitly discouraging alcohol use, or passively, by providing models of drinking behavior.4


  • Perceptions of how much peers drink may exert a stronger influence on an individual's drinking behavior than the actual level of peer drinking.5


  • Parents can exert a moderating influence on the drinking behavior of their adolescent children by actively monitoring their alcohol use.6


  • Studies have shown that a positive relationship between parents and adolescents can serve as a protective factor, offsetting the risk of alcohol use associated with peer alcohol use.7

How Parental Attitudes and Behaviors Toward Drinking Effect Youth

  • Parents' drinking behavior and favorable attitudes about drinking have been positively associated with adolescents' initiating and continuing drinking.8


  • Children of drinking parents were less likely to see drinking as harmful and more likely to start drinking earlier. Both these attitudes and behaviors, in turn, predicted greater alcohol misuse at age 17 to 18.9


  • Children of drinking parents are more likely to associate with peers who have tried alcohol at ages 10 to 11, which increases the risk for alcohol use and misuse by the child. 10

Below you will find graphs showing that rates of underage drinking have been steadily declining, largely in part to parents becoming more aware and educated on the matter and less likely to approve of the "rite of passage" beliefs.

Figure01
Above you will find that the proportion of high school seniors who have consumed alcohol within previous year is down. 11

Figure02
Above you will find that the proportion of high school seniors who have consumed alcohol within previous 30 days is down. 12

 

Underage Drinking during Graduation, Prom and other big events


These are events that for our generation were synomonous for drinking. Things have not changed in that youth still want to drink; except that more youth today are choosing to avoid taking the risks associated with drinking and they are choosing to enjoy these landmark events sober. If you believe your child is planning on drinking during these events, talk to them about being part of the majority and not the minority. Identify the health related risks and reasons why more youth choose not to drink.


Alcohol related media and clothing: What you wear as a parent sends a message


What is in your house? Do you have a neon Budweiser sign? Maybe sports memorabilia that glorifies drinking.

Social norming is a process by which we are told what is acceptable and what is not acceptable based on the behaviors and messages sent by those people who have influence over us. You have influence over your child at all times therefore wearing a beer shirt or displaying other alcohol related products is likely sending the wrong message. These messages re-enforce that it is OK to involve alcohol in activities and events that do not need alcohol involved to be enjoyable. They also turn a very dangerous and addictive substance into a fashion statement. More adults are choosing not to wear these things or allow their children to wear these things. If you currently wear or allow the wear of these items, explore how it might be unintentionally sending the "it's ok to drink" message to your child(ren).

 

 

Citations:

  1. Hawkins, J.D., Graham, J.W., Maguin, E., Abbot, R., Hill, K.G., and Catalano, R., Exploring the effects of age of alcohol use initiationand psychosocial risk factors on subsequent alcohol misuse, Journal of Studies on Alcohol, 1997.

  2. National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism, Youth Drinking: Risk Factors and Consequences, Alcohol Alert No. 37, 1997.

  3. Jacob, T., and Johnson, S., Parenting Influences on the Development of Alcohol Abuse and Dependence, Alcohol Health andResearch World, Volume 21, 1997.

  4. National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism, Ninth Special Report to the U.S. Congress on Alcohol and Health, Bethesda, MD: U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, 1997.

  5. National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism, Ninth Special Report to the U.S. Congress on Alcohol and Health, Bethesda, MD: U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, 1997.

  6. Ibid

  7. Jacob, T., and Johnson, S., Parenting Influences on the Development of Alcohol Abuse and Dependence, Alcohol Health and Research World, Volume 21, 1997.

  8. National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism, Youth Drinking: Risk Factors and Consequences, Alcohol Alert No. 37, 1997.

  9. Hawkins, J.D., Graham, J.W., Maguin, E., Abbot, R., Hill, K.G., and Catalano, R., Exploring the effects of age of alcohol use initiation and psychosocial risk factors on subsequent alcohol misuse, Journal of Studies on Alcohol, 1997.

  10. Ibid

  11. Johnston, L. D., O'Malley, P.M., Bachman, J. G. and Schulenberg, J. E. Monitoring the Future national Survey Results on Drug Use, 1975-2006. Volume I, Secondary School Students. Bethesda, MD: National Institute on Drug Abuse, 2007. 669 pages. (NIH Publication No. 07-6205) Table 5.2.

  12. Johnston, L. D., O'Malley, P. M., Bachman, J. G. and Schulenberg, J. E. Monitoring the Future national Survey Results on Drug Use, 1975-2006. Volume I, Secondary School Students. Bethesda, MD: National Institute on Drug Abuse, 2007. 669 pages. (NIH Publication No. 07-6205) Table 5.3.