Since we began this blog discussing misleading studies, I thought I would turn our attention to a recent �??study�?? by the American Medical Association.

Back in March, the AMA released a �??study�?? on alcohol and sex during spring break trips.�� The AMA said that the study was based on the responses of 644 college women and graduates ages 27-35.�� Their study noted a number of things: spring break trips involve more or heavier drinking; women use drinking as an excuse for outrageous behavior; and that alcohol is easy to get on spring break.

Now, I�?Tm not saying that college students don�?Tt drink and party on spring break trips.�� However, what I do want to bring everyone�?Ts attention is that what the AMA is claiming as scientific research is not as scientific as they would like us to believe.

Howard Kurtz from the Washington Post accurately points out, �??this poll had zero scientific validity.�??�� Randomly selected respondents were not the participants in the poll �?’ it was an Internet survey with self-selected participants.�� According to Cliff Zukin, president of the American Association for Public Opinion Research, (a bona fide expert in the field of public opinion research) dismissed the AMA survey as �??scientifically useless.�?? [Note: This quote is excerpted from a Wall Street Journal article.�� To access the article, you must log on to www.wsj.com.]

And of course after the study was released (and before the truth was exposed) the media ate it up.�� Mystery Pollster has noted that stories on the poll appeared in thousand of newspapers across the country.

This leads me to conclude a couple of things: 1) how many �??studies�?? has the AMA released that we just accept as scientific fact; and 2) why isn�?Tt the media more responsible with their reporting?

As I have said a number of times, underage drinking is unacceptable.�� But passing off bogus studies as scientific fact is not the answer.

Radley Balko, a blogger from http://www.cato-at-liberty.org/, the official Cato Institute blog, recently deconstructed the CASA study we�-?ve been discussing here and brought up some�= interesting points that I wanted to share with you.

Bottom line - according to independent experts, the misuse of data that we have been discussing in this space may actually be putting our youth at risk. Read on.

Balko points out that CASA has a nasty habit of fudging its numbers for the sake of sensationalism.�= (And you don�-?t have to take my word for it �-? read what a Ph.D., who suggests CASA change its name to �-�the Center for Alcohol Statistics Abuse,�-? has to say about their historical manipulation of the facts.)

Subsequently, and perhaps even worse, there is a dangerous trend among some well-respected journalists at top tier media outlets �-? The New York Times, for one �-? who fail to confirm the accuracy of CASA�-?s research and jump to cover the �-�news�-? from this organization and others in the habit of fictionalizing science.

One of the reasons I find this trend so troubling is because perpetuating this �-�data�-? could actually increase underage drinking.�= At Diageo, we think any underage drinking is too much, period.�= Exaggerating these numbers is not only unethical, it is also downright dangerous.

H. Wesley Perkins, Ph.D., Professor of Sociology and department Chair at Hobart and William Smith Colleges has done extensive research that suggests students often believe their peers drink more, and more often, than they actually do.�= And the troubling part is that those students will then model their behavior after what they think their peers are doing, oftentimes leading them to drink more.

Dr. Perkins accurately hypothesized that correcting these misperceptions can reduce underage drinking.�= This led to a revolutionary new approach to alcohol education.�= Instead of utilizing traditional, ineffective �-�scare tactics,�-? many academic institutions now use the social norms approach to educate students on accurate norms amongst their peers.

And it works.

In April 2006, when the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism (NIAAA) issued its Alcohol Alert, it was noted that �-�the phenomenon of perceived social norms�-�or the belief that �-�everyone�-? is drinking and drinking is acceptable�-�is one of the strongest correlates of drinking among young adults�-�Recent research has shown that addressing these misperceptions can help reduce drinking.�-?

At the end of the day, we all want to eliminate underage drinking.�= And the good news is that underage drinking is on the decline.

So why does CASA continue to release erroneous �-�research,�-? putting our youth at risk?

Cheers!

guy

Liquor Angel is right.  Parents need to teach their kids how to behave responsibly and pay more attention to what their kids are doing.

The crowd over at CASA wants you to believe that underage drinking is at its absolute worst in years.  Here’s one of the things they’ve had to say:

“Beer and other alcohol is the number one drug of abuse for American children and teens.  Rates of teen drinking remain at epidemic proportions with underage drinkers annually downing 19.7 percent of all the alcohol consumed in the U.S.”  (Joe Califano, CASA, Sept. 10, 2003)

This sounds harsh, doesn’t it?  If CASA is your source for information on underage drinking, then of course the situation looks grim.

Now, we can all agree that in the U.S. there is too much underage drinking, but let’s consider what some other sources are showing us.

“Monitoring the Future,” an ongoing study of the behaviors, attitudes, and values of American secondary school students, college students, and young adults has shown that current drinking is down among 8th graders, 10th graders and 12th graders.  In fact 8th grade current drinking is at the lowest level since 1991, when it began to be tracked (down 32%), 10th grade is at the lowest level since 1991 (down 22%), and 12th grade current drinking is at the lowest level since 1975, when it began to be tracked (down 6% since 2000 and down 41% since 1982).

And while we’re spouting out facts, according to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, in 2004, teenage alcohol-related traffic fatalities were down 13% since 2000 and down 62% since 1982.

Another government agency, the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA), has found that 82% of adolescents ages 12-17 do not drink and 71% of underage youth, ages 12-20 do not drink.

As we’ve said before, any underage drinking is too much and we want parents to help us keep alcohol out of the hands of their kids. The white coats at the National Academy of Sciences said as much in their 2003 report on the problem: “…[U]nderage drinking cannot be successfully addressed by focusing on youth alone….[Youth] usually obtain alcohol—either directly or indirectly—from adults. Efforts to reduce underage drinking, therefore, need to focus on adults and must engage the society at large.”

Obviously, we don’t want anyone under the age of 21 purchasing our products.  We do, however, want to make sure that everyone gets their facts straight so we can know how to fix the problem. 

Underage drinking is on the decline, not as rapidly as we all want, but if we don’t have an accurate understanding of where we are and where we’ve been, it makes it doubly hard to figure out what to do next. 

Let me end today’s epistle with a question.  Susan, where are you?  The Susan we’re searching for is Susan Foster, referred to in our inaugural posting.  Susan is a wheel over at CASA and she has her name on lots of these outrageously wrong “facts” about underage drinking.

We haven’t had a retort from Susan (or anyone else at CASA) defending her position and her “facts.”  Come on Susan, we are all waiting…and hopeful!

Cheers!

guy