Thaindian News

Washington, June 1 (IANS) The prevalence and frequency of alcohol-induced traffic-risk behaviour became worse when college students turned 21 years.
Alcohol-impaired driving and associated motor-vehicle accidents are a major public-health problem, says a new study.

National studies have shown that approximately 25 percent of college students report that they have driven while intoxicated in the past month.

“Drinking and driving endangers the safety of not only the drinking driver and passengers, but also other individuals on the road,” said study co-author Amelia M. Arria, of the University of Maryland School of Public Health (UMSPH).

Arria and her colleagues recruited 1,253 first-time, first-year students (645 females, 608 males) attending a large, mid-Atlantic university.

All were invited to be interviewed annually for four years regarding their alcohol-related traffic risk behaviours (with 88-91 percent follow-up rates); access to driving a car was also determined annually.

Three alcohol-related traffic risk behaviours were examined: riding with a driver who was under the influence of alcohol (RWID), driving after drinking any alcohol (DAD), and driving while intoxicated (DWI).

Results showed that risky alcohol-related traffic behaviours are quite common among college students.

“In the preceding year, nearly half of underage students with access to a car drove after having anything to drink and one in five drove while intoxicated,” said Arria.

“For instance, at 20 years of age, eight percent drove after drinking any alcohol, and 20 percent drove while intoxicated. Moreover, among all 20-year-olds - regardless of car access - 43 percent rode with an intoxicated driver.” Males were more likely to engage in these behaviours than females.

“There were noticeable increases in all three measures of alcohol-related traffic risk - RWID, DWI and DAD - when students reached the legal drinking age of 21,” said Arria.

“Our findings call into question the assertions of some advocates who claim that lowering the drinking age to 18 would be a useful strategy for reducing harm associated with alcohol consumption,” said Arria, according to a UMSPH release.

“The present findings are consistent with numerous prior studies showing that increased availability of alcohol is associated with a greater level of problems especially underage drinking-and-driving fatal crashes,” Arria concluded.

Results are slated for publication in the August issue of Alcoholism: Clinical & Experimental Research.