ALCOHOL ADDICTION IN TEENAGERS
One can define addiction to alcohol as a continuous urge and desire to consume alcoholic drinks at all times of the day. An addict is an individual who cannot survive without the commodity, to which he has an addiction. On several occasions, the individual will experience certain side effects as a result of not consuming the commodity or service. For example, an individual who has an alcohol addiction is likely to suffer from anxiety and restlessness if he or she does not take alcohol regularly. Addiction to alcohol manifests itself in different ways, depending on the body set up of the individual suffering from the addiction. Alcohol remains to be the most abused drug among teenagers in most countries, notably, in the United States. According to recent findings, approximately a half of the junior and senior high school students consume alcoholic drinks on a monthly basis. In addition, approximately 14 percent of teens in the USA have been under intoxication at least once in the past year. The most alarming trend that is arising is that these teens drink a wide variety of the alcoholic drinks, which increases the damage on their health. Other specialists have defined alcohol addiction as the negative pattern of alcohol use that leads to several health problems. Some of the problems include the urge for additional alcohol to experience intoxication, difficulties that occur when the impacts of the alcohol wears off from the individual, and other social problems that come as a result of consuming alcohol (Castillo, 2009).
Causes and Risk Factors of Alcohol Addiction among Teenagers
There are certain elements that encourage the progress of an alcoholic behavior among teenagers. Most of these factors usually comprise of family factors that occur in the homes of these teenagers. First, low levels of supervision and communication from the parents to teenage children is likely to foster a drinking habit in a teenager. Children in the teenage years are in a period of experimentation, and it is at this time that they need adequate attention from the parents. When parents fail to stay close to their children at this stage in life, there is a tendency that these children may fall victims of peer pressure, and start consuming alcohol (Essau, 2002).
Family conflicts also contribute massively towards alcohol addiction among the teens. Young children are not proficient at dealing with problems in their families. The most notable family conflict in families is that of marital misunderstandings between the mother and father. Teenagers tend to keep their minds off the misunderstandings between parents by consuming drugs, mostly alcohol. Persistent conflicts in the family will lead to the development of the drinking habit in such a young person, leading to addictiocauen (Monti, 2012).
Family History of Alcohol Addiction
Some teenagers tend to drink alcohol because some members of the family were heavy drinkers. This is most common in a situation where these past family drinkers were successful in life at some point. Thus, a teenager will look at alcohol as a positive effect on someone’s potential and success. This continued exposure to alcohol will eventually lead to addiction at a tender age.
Exposure to alcohol at a tender teen age is likely to lead to heavy alcoholism in the later years of an individual. For instance, teens that start drinking at an age of 14 to 16 years have a high tendency of suffering from alcoholism during their maturity age (Stewart, 2009).
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