The Saline Reporter
A Heritage Newspaper
Weekly Publication
Teens who drink alcohol may damage their brains
PUBLISHED: April 17, 2008
Nearly half of all eighth-graders have had at least one drink, and more than 20 percent report having been drunk. Consuming five or more drinks of alcohol at a time for men and four or more drinks at a time for women is considered binge drinking. Nearly one-third of all 12th-graders binge drink.
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These disturbing facts have been published by the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism.
April is Alcohol Awareness Month and a good time to start talking to your children about why they should not begin drinking before they turn 21.
Some parents may think that teenage alcohol use is a rite of passage or a less dangerous alternative to stronger drugs, but the research on childhood brain development makes it very clear that drinking alcohol can have a lifetime effect on young people. Heavy alcohol use may have extensive and long-lasting effects on the brain, ranging from simple slips in memory to conditions that last a lifetime.
The human brain continues to develop in the teen years and even into the 20s. The brain's frontal lobe, which is involved in planning, decision-making, impulse control and language, undergoes a major remodeling during the teen years. There is concern that drinking alcohol during this period of growth may lead to brain damage, especially for memory, physical skills and coordination.
Most of the damage done by alcohol during adolescence is due to its inference with neurotransmitters, the things that send messages to the brain. Alcohol injects chemicals into the brain that affect important growing processes.
For example, alcohol stimulates the release of dopamine, the "feel good" neurotransmitter. Whenever a person heavily uses a substance like alcohol, the body stops producing the levels of dopamine that it normally needs. As a result, a person will feel worse and worse then they don't have alcohol in their system.
Heavy alcohol use interferes with the brain's ability to form memories. That's why it's hard to remember what happened after a night of heavy drinking. The results of alcohol use begin to add up. Evidence shows that adolescents who are heavy drinkers have a smaller hippocampus than non-drinkers. The hippocampus is the brain structure that is key to the process of recording new memories.
Adolescents, unlike adults, are still forming connections between nerve cells that play a role in memory, and alcohol may damage the development of these connections. Adolescent who drink a lot of alcohol also end up having more memory and learning impairment than adults who drink the same amount because their brains are more pliable and easily affected by alcohol's damage.
Educating children and teens about the dangers and consequences of underage drinking is important. Kids don't need to experience alcohol to know that it's bad for them. They need parents and others to tell them in a way that makes sense to them.
Talk to your kids about the dangers of underage drinking. Visit the Web site SCRUD.org for more information.
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