Of Substance

Drugs and Alcohol

OK, I’m going to be blogging regularly on this site about drugs and alcohol, but before I get into that, I’d like to start with a little bit about who I am, and why I’m writing this. I am a social worker who has been practicing for over thirty years now, and I’m currently the Director of Human Services for the Town of Mansfield. I’m also the parent of an 18 and a 21 year old, and have lived in Mansfield for about twenty years.

My first job out of college was working as a counselor in an alcohol detoxification unit, and working with “street alcoholics” was an incredible eye-opener for me. Since that time much of my professional career has involved helping individuals with alcohol and substance abuse problems, and I’ve seen countless examples of the impact of alcohol and substance abuse on lives, families and careers.

I was thinking about what to write for this blog yesterday as I was watching the Super Bowl, and realized that this is a great opportunity to talk about the impact that advertising has on our attitudes towards alcohol use. We all know that the Super Bowl provides one of the greatest television advertising opportunities of the year, and many of us look forward to the latest Budweiser commercial (remember Spuds McKenzie and the singing frogs?). While I appreciate the entertainment value of those ads, I think we need to consider the impact that they have on the millions of youth who watch them along with us. A national study published in Archives of Pediatrics and Adolescent Medicine (Archives of Pediatric and Adolescent Medicine, January 2006:160:18-24) concluded that greater exposure to alcohol advertising contributes to an increase in drinking among underage youth. The study found that youth who saw more alcohol advertisements on average drank more than those who did not see the ads.

Furthermore, according to the Marin Institute, an alcohol industry watchdog organization, the large alcohol companies get half of their profits from underage and binge drinking sales. To me these ads have a lot to do with delivering messages about our attitudes and beliefs about the use of alcohol, and it was striking to me as a former workplace counselor to see a Bud Light ad called “Office Meeting” that involved people sitting around a conference table drinking beer. “Media messages about alcohol, tobacco and other drugs provide many opportunities for youth to learn how to use, circumstances where it is acceptable or even desirable to use, how to improve their use techniques and an association with positive consequences of use.”

These messages not only impact the individual, but also help to set the tone for how we look at these things in our community. I think these ads present a great opportunity to talk with our kids about alcohol use and how it is portrayed. Ask your kids they think about these commercials, what’s the message that they get, and how does this affect their attitudes towards alcohol use?

I’m always looking for these “teachable moments” that can open a dialogue between kids and parents, and I think that this provides a great opportunity to do just that.

I’d love to know what you’re thoughts are, and I’m looking forward to hearing from you. For more information on the impact of advertising you can visit these sites: www.camy.org; The Center on Alcohol Marketing and Youth at Georgetown University; http://www.marininstitute.org/; The Marin Institute; and http://www.cspinet.org ; the Center for Science in the Public Interest. http://www.DrugFreeActionAlliance.org.