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Drunk Driving in Teens – Is your Child at Stake?

April 21, 2010
Author: Chris M. Alexander

As parents, it is important that we understand the issues that affect our children. We must understand that the realities of life are far different from when we grew up as kids. In our days as children, parents had more control over what, where and who their children associate with, without fear of the authorities accusing you of being anti-social or repressive. Today kids are given more freedom to develop their personalities and this has led to some being influenced by the wrong individuals who lead them into a habit of alcohol consumption. As a result, majority of teenagers are at risk.

Studies show that most teenagers practice what is known as “binge drinking”, where they consume five or more alcoholic beverages in one sitting. At their stage of physical development, their bodies are unable to withstand such high blood-alcohol concentrations. These results in them are becoming significantly disorientated where they exhibit a significant reduction in their judgment. When we add this fact with inexperience as a driver, all we can see is an accident just looking for a location to happen. This fact was corroborated by data issued by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration where they stated that although teens between the ages of sixteen to twenty only occupied 6.4% of driver’s license issued each year, these teens account for a disproportionately high percent of road accidents such as collisions, crashes and fatalities due to drunk driving.

What can Parents do about their Drunk-Driving Kids?

Many steps can be taken to determine if your child is at risk of drunk driving. Some of these steps include:

• Lead by Example: A huge majority of kids will tell you they started drinking at ages 12 or 13. At this age, they are not going to clubs or bars. So where do they get this alcohol from? We adults sometimes leave our bottles of alcohol carelessly around the house thinking they are of no interest to our kids. However kids practice what they see us do as adults and will become curious about drinking alcohol if the see us doing it. Always ensure that alcoholic beverages are carefully stored away from children and reduce their exposure to seeing us consuming it.
• Discussion: Start from a young age to educate your kids about the dangers of alcohol consumption and drunk driving. Be a good mentor to your kids, so when your kids express a desire to consume alcohol they will think about the effects it will have on them and you as a parent. Teach them resistance skills that will enable them to ward off peer pressure from friends who encourage them to drink and drive.
• Monitoring: Track your kid’s movement, their friends and the places they go. Most kids are involved in alcohol consumption and subsequent drunk driving based on the influence of friends. Set cut off times for clubbing and ensure that they have a designated driver whenever they go out. Also, look out for behavioral changes to detect when something is wrong.

Do you have other suggestions to control drunk driving in teens? We would really like to hear them out, do share your thoughts in the comment section below.

Tags: Binge Drinking, Teenage Drunk Driving

This entry was posted on Wednesday, April 21st, 2010 at 3:32 am and is filed under Teenage Drunk Drivers . You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.