A recent study by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and published in the January 2007 issue of Pediatrics, Binge Drinking and Associated Health Risk Behaviors Among High School Students, states that “binge drinking is the most common pattern of alcohol consumption among high school youth who drink alcohol and is strongly associated with a wide range of other health risk behaviors.” 

Although we know that youth use of alcohol for 8th, 10th and 12th graders was down across the board over the last five years, according to the 2006 Monitoring the Future survey, and current drinking (past 30 days) among 12th graders is at the lowest level since the study began in 1975, and is down 14% since 1997, underage drinking remains an important issue that needs to be addressed.

So the question for parents is, “what can we do?”

And the answer I’d offer is that there are MANY things you can do.  Consider one expert’s opinion: Richard Gallagher, Ph.D., Director of the Parenting Institute and Thriving Teens Project believes that “parents remain the greatest influence over their children’s behavior.”

Among the tips  Dr. Gallagher offers parents:

1) Clearly state what actions you expect your teen to take when confronted with substance use.
2) Talk about the alcohol use that your children observe.
3) Limit the access your children have to substances.

The Century Council, funded by Diageo and other spirits companies, addresses the issue of underage drinking and drunk driving. In its Underage Drinking Worksheet, The Century Council also points out the importance of parental involvement:
A qualitative research study conducted by Amica Insurance confirmed that teenagers whose parents talk with them versus talk at them might be less at risk to engage in harmful behavior involving alcohol. What’s more, teens said they would be more apt not to drink and drive if they had heard directly from their parents how important they are to them.

When it comes down to it, a lot of this advice boils down to talking to your kids and being involved in their lives.

If you’re looking for a good starting point, check out some resources offered by The Century Council that can help parents talk to their children about underage drinking.  Girl Talk,  Ask, Listen, and Learn,   and Parents, you’re not done yet.  are some of the programs available on The Century Council web site that give parents the tools that will assist them in their conversations with their children.

First things first, let’s get something straight.  Irresponsible use of alcohol is an important issue, and one that the government, industry, public and a host of other stakeholders take quite seriously.  Some focus on developing policies to keep us safe from the harm associated with the misuse of beverage alcohol, a laudable goal.  However, at times, this is done in the absence of a firm grip on the facts.

Take, for example, a recent report from Join Together’s website that would have us believe that the 2003 Licensing Act which allows for extended operating hours for pubs and bars in the UK has led to mayhem at closing time.  A scary thought, to be sure, but it doesn’t reflect what research is showing from the front lines:

• 13 police forces across England and Wales found no marked rise in alcohol related crimes since the Act was enacted; 6 police forces reported a fall and 5 reported a rise in response to a survey conducted by and published in the English newspaper The Independent in November 2006.

• In Wirral, England, people reporting assaults at the Accident and Emergency Department fell by 15% according to a study conducted by the Centre for Public Health at Liverpool after the Act was introduced.

• In the English county of Sussex, 1,000 fewer people reported injuries after the Act was enacted, leading the Asst. Chief Constable of Sussex to comment: “Concerns over 24-hour drinking leading to a significant increase in alcohol-fuelled violence and public nuisance have not materialized.”

• In Norwich England, six months after the change in operating hours, police officials reported 584 fewer violent offences compared to the same period a year earlier.  Says Inspector Peter Walsh, “We’re no longer seeing the huge queues for clubs and taxis at 11:30pm and then 2am which were often associated with trouble and we no longer see large crowds pouring out on to the street all at the same time.”

Alcohol-related policies are an important part of our society, but it’s critical that the people making – and commenting on – these policies are  relying on actual FACTS.

It’s pretty frustrating when some of the most “reputable” scientific institutions in our country lead us astray…and then, when their methodology is debunked, they correct themselves…but they do so very quietly. 

Case in point: The American Medical Association published an erroneous survey in March 2006 about underage drinking claiming that girls were drinking excessively on college spring break tours.  A shocking finding…if it were true. 

The study was a non-random Internet poll of volunteers.  And of those volunteers, only about 27% had even BEEN on spring break! Nevertheless, the Associated Press jumped on it without even a question as to the validity of the methodology and proceeded to run a story on the “findings” shortly after the release of the study. 

 Fortunately, we have watchdogs out there like the American Association for Public Opinion Research and Mystery Pollster that caught this study and exposed the AMA for their deceptive findings. Though the AMA eventually modified its release, the amendments were hardly publicized and, of course, garnered MUCH less attention then the initial study.

You may be asking yourself why I’m writing about this in January of 2007, nearly one year later.I’ll tell you why: the drama goes on. 

The Columbia Journalism Review and the AP have been bickering over the AP’s role in perpetuating this bogus study on the pages of the Review.  Last month, the CJR wrote a “dart” criticizing the AP’s “delayed reaction and impaired judgment” on this study.  The latest chapter unfolds in the January/February issue in which the AP responds in a Letter to the Editor (which, unfortunately, isn’t available online) to the CJR’s criticism of how the AP handled the situation.

I’m not going to get into all of the details of the mud-slinging, but the point I want to make is that here we not only have a case of a special interest organization using dubious data to further its own agenda, but we also have an example of the AP, one of the most preeminent news wires in this country, adding fuel to the fire.

I don’t want to blame the individual reporter or bureau that issued the story because I think this is really a larger issue that I’ve seen in assorted news organizations across the country.  As budgets are cut and staffing is reduced, we - the consumers of news - are often the victims of misinformation.    

Have you ever wondered what goes through the minds of people that feel so strongly on an issue that they just make things up? The world is full of well-intentioned folks who just can’t look at an issue and dispassionately articulate the facts.

Now comes the Chicago Tribune with an article about the “Top 10 Dubious Data List,” a fascinating collection of outrageous misinformation that during 2006 was laid before the public. Not surprisingly to those of us who have been in the alcohol business for longer than 10 minutes, some of the most outrageous, egregious “dubious” honors center on alcohol. Now don’t get me wrong, there are problems with irresponsible use of alcohol and lots of people in the industry, in not-for-profits, and in the government, are working hard to combat them. But hey, why can’t these characters just tell things straight?
Read on:

Low and behold, a number of the past year’s top media fabrications listed in the “Top 10 Dubious Data” list concerned alcohol and underage drinking. Take a look:

• “The media gushed over an AP report that “all but confirm[ed] what goes on in those `Girls Gone Wild’ spring-break videos:” young women blacking out from drinking, having sex with more than one partner and so forth. Actually, the American Medical Association study was a non-random Internet poll of volunteers, of which only 27 percent had been on spring break.”

• “The Wall Street Journal misreported that teenage girls increased alcohol consumption more than 30 percent from 1999 to 2004. The study’s mistake was that it treated, for example, a 6-ounce glass of alcohol the same as an ounce of alcohol mixed with 5 ounces of orange juice. U.S. government studies show that binge drinking by college-age women has remained steady since 1980 and daily drinking has been declining since 2002.”

• “Forbes and The New York Times bit on a study by the National Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse, which claimed that the alcohol industry reaped almost $50 billion, or half its revenue, from underage drinkers. To buy that, you have to believe that teen drinkers consume as much as all adult drinkers combined, and that half of all teens consume more than 1,000 drinks a year, or almost three daily.”

Three cheers to the Chicago Tribune for getting out the facts. We need more reporters and news organizations to ask better questions before they just publish whatever these guys have to say. They sure ask me lots of questions!

If you want any detail on any of these three studies, just let me know. And, as always, anyone associated with any of the three items mentioned is welcome to post a response, a defense, an apologia right here at www.NoBullBar.com
guy

Loyal readers of NoBullBar.com know that CASA has a long history of playing fast and loose with the facts.  And just last week, Susan Foster showed that they’re at it again.

She was quoted in the New York Daily News saying, “’We’re seeing an increase in rates of drinking to get drunk” among teens.

Sounds terrible!  And it would be…if it were true.

Susan based her comments on The National Youth Risk Behavior Survey conducted by the Department of Health and Human Services, a federal agency that is a part of the Center for Disease Control and Prevention.  The study was conducted from 1991-2005 with a representative sample of 9th trough 12th grade students throughout the United States. 

It found NO CHANGE in episodic heavy drinking from 1991 to 2005.  In fact, they found a DECREASE from 1997 to 2005 in heaving drinking behavior and the trend was consistent when they looked at lifetime alcohol use, current alcohol use and use of alcohol on school property.

Susan, CASA: I encourage you to join us in being part of the SOLUTION.  It’s about time you stop twisting the facts to support your political agenda.

As always, we invite Susan to post her comments on why she distorts these and other facts right here on www.NoBullBar.com

Cheers!

guy

My suspicions were right! Apparently the American Medical Association (AMA) has previously reported “junk science” as fact when it comes to alcohol consumption. Thank you, Rachel R., for bringing to my attention the Op-Ed in PR Week by Greg Schneiders. It’s nice to know that folks are beginning to pick up on the truth surrounding these loosely characterized “studies.”

According to the Op-Ed, in 2001 the AMA released a “study” on college binge drinking, but again their polling methodology was flawed.

It’s a shame that the AMA didn’t use more scientific polling to conduct their studies as they are typically a credible organization that serves to improve the health of our nation. I’m shocked that when it came to underage drinking and alcohol abuse they didn’t ensure that their polling methods were more accurate.

In contrast, I thought I’d draw your attention to a study that Anheuser-Busch commissioned recently, which found that a vast majority of American drinkers ages 21 and over (94 percent), say they drink responsibly and in moderation. The survey assesses the attitudes and behaviors of American adults regarding responsible and moderate drinking and found overwhelming public support for moderation.

While we’re pleased to hear these results, what’s more important is the methodology that was applied to the survey and lends a great deal of credibility to the results. A-B partnered with Harris Interactive, a leading, reputable market research firm, widely known within that industry. The methodology was laid out in the original press release announcing the findings:

Harris Interactive conducted the telephone survey on behalf of Anheuser-Busch between March 2-6, 2006, among a nationwide cross section of 963 U.S. adults ages 21 and over (26 and over in California), of whom, 816 drink alcohol beverages. The data were weighted to be representative of the total U.S. adult population on the basis of education, age by sex, race/ethnicity, region, household income and number of telephone lines in the household. In theory, with a probability sample of this size, one can say with 95 percent certainty that the overall results, as well as the results for those who drink alcohol beverages, have a sampling error of plus or minus 3 percentage points of what they would be if the entire U.S. adult population had been polled with complete accuracy.

I find it comforting when groups who conduct important studies of this nature disclose how they arrived at the results. The Harris study is a perfect example.

As I’ve said before, it’s impossible to fix a problem if the information we receive about it is a result of unscientific polls, studies that inflate the problem without evidence, or just bad data. If the AMA would apply the same ideals to alcohol that they apply to other areas of health, we could collaborate with them on finding solutions to our common challenges.

Hopefully, they’ll give Harris Interactive a call for their next study!
Cheers,
Guy

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

WJLA (ABC) Channel 7 in Washington, D.C. - whose location in the nation’s capital makes them even more influential than most local TV stations might be - has weighed in for the second time this month on the subject of underage drinking.  Channel 7 got it right for focusing the responsibility for preventing alcohol consumption by youth where it belongs:  on parents.  As the TV station — known for its “Seven on Your Side” slogan — pointed out in its report, “The number one thing parents can do is be parents, not pals. Stay on top of the kids. Supervise and network. Realize what kids are up against.”

This focus on parents represents a marked improvement on the station’s earlier effort this month on the issue of underage drinking, in which it accepted at face value a study by a researcher Columbia University’s National Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse (CASA).  The CASA study argued that 17.5 percent of the alcohol industry’s revenue comes from underage drinkers. Interesting. Yeah, but get this: George Mason University’s Statistical Assessment Service (STATS) recently reviewed the CASA study and found that it was “riddled with errors.”  Based on the statisticians’ at George Mason University review of the calculations and assumptions, STATS writes of CASA’s research:  “The number of drinks consumed by youth under 21 is overestimated, the cost per drink is overestimated, the amount of drink attributed to abuse and dependence is overestimated, and the benefit to the industry of youth drinking and alcohol abuse and dependence is overestimated.”

Or as we baseball fans would put it:  CASA was 0 for 4, but then CASA has a history of being out on lots of there research! Not a good night at the plate - or in the field of research.

Here’s the deal: despite the accusations and flawed research of CASA and others, we don’t want young people’s (meaning anyone under 21 years of age!) business.  We don’t need it.  

We hope that parents will take Channel 7’s advice and step up to bat - and join us in our efforts to keep our products out of the hands of their kids.  We need not only Seven — but also more important, America’s parents — on our side in the battle against underage drinking. Check out what The Century Council has to say on parents and underage drinking. They have a dynamite website chock full of information that is very useful in the fight against underage drinking.

Listen, any underage drinking is too much. Dontcha just wonder why CASA persists in getting their figures wrong?

Cheers!

guy