Drinking Trends Differ among College Students, Young Adults

07-15-2012

While the annual Monitoring the Future Surveys continue to show significant, steady declines in drinking among junior- and senior high school students in the US, trends among college students and other young adults age 19-28 are much more varied. For example, the table below shows that while drinking during the previous month declined modestly among college students from 2001 to 2011, it increased slightly among all young adults age 19-28. (Not that there's anything wrong with that, since the vast, vast majority of those in the latter sample are legal age.

Similarly, rates of daily drinking, so-called "binge" drinking and getting drunk (at least once in the prior 30 days) among college students declined at a double-digit pace during this period. But each of those measures increased among the larger group of young adults. (Once again, there's certainly nothing wrong with daily drinking among 21-28 yr-olds.) In any case, very few young adults say they drink every day, 3.8% of college students and 5.2% of young adults overall. Two measures that increased among college students 2006-2010: consumption of flavored alcohol beverages and daily pot smoking. But the more recent trend for FAB consumption among college students shows an 18% decline since 2008. Note too that a higher percentage of both college students and young adults say they smoke pot every day than drink every day. Ref 1