Alcohol TV ads linked with underage drinking: study

Watching alcohol advertisements on TV may prompt drinking, binge drinking and hazardous drinking among underage youth, according to a new study.
Researchers examined the reach of television advertising and its effect on drinking in young people.
They conducted telephone- and web-based surveys with 2,541 adolescents and young adults between the ages of 15 and 23 years at baseline, with 1,596 completing a follow-up survey.
The surveys examined recall of more than 300 television advertising images for top beer and distilled spirits brands that aired across US in 2010-11.
The authors derived an alcohol receptivity score based on having seen the ad, liking it and correctly identifying the brand.

"The alcohol industry claims that their advertising self-regulation programme protects underage youths from seeing their ads," said Susanne E Tanski from Children's Hospital at Dartmouth-Hitchcock (CHaD) in US.

"Our study indicates that it does not," said Tanski.
Participants who were underage were only slightly less likely than legal-drinking-age participants to have seen alcohol ads (the average percentage of ads seen were 23.4 per cent, 22.7 per cent and 25.6 per cent, respectively, for young people ages 15-17, 18-20 and 21-23 years of age).
Survey results indicate that higher alcohol receptivity score among underage participants predicted the onset of drinking, binge drinking and hazardous drinking in the future.

The transition to binge drinking (participants were asked how often they have six or more drinks on one occasion) and hazardous drinking (which was defined as meeting or exceeding a threshold score for frequency and quantity of alcohol use) happened for 29 per cent and 18 per cent of young people ages 15 to 17 years, respectively, and for 29 per cent and 19 per cent of young people ages 18 to 20 years, respectively.
"Alcohol companies claim their advertising does not affect underage drinking - that instead it is parents and friends that are the culprits," said James D Sargent, senior author on the study and a CHaD pediatrician.

"This study suggests otherwise - that underage youths are exposed to and engaged by alcohol marketing and this prompts initiation of drinking as well as transitions from trying to hazardous drinking," said Sargent.
"Our study found that familiarity with and response to images of television alcohol marketing was associated with the subsequent onset of drinking across a range of outcomes of varying severity among adolescents and young adults, adding to studies suggesting that alcohol advertising is one cause of youth drinking," Sargent added.
The study was published in the journal JAMA Pediatrics.