A telephone survey of parental attitudes and behaviours regarding teenage drinking
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Journal ArticleDate:
2010Citation:
Smyth, B.P., Darker, C., Donnelly-Swift, E., Barry, J.M., & Allwright, S.P., A telephone survey of parental attitudes and behaviours regarding teenage drinking, BMC Public Health, 10, 2010, 297Download Item:
Abstract:
Background:
Irish teenagers demonstrate high rates of drunkenness and there has been a
progressive fall in age of first drinking in recent decades. International research
indicates that parents exert substantial influence over their teenager?s drinking. We
sought to determine the attitudes and behaviours of Irish parents towards drinking by
their adolescent children.
Methods:
We conducted a telephone survey of a representative sample of of 234 parents who
had a teenager aged between 13 and 17 years.
Results:
Six per cent reported that they would be unconcerned if their son or daughter was to
binge drink once per month. On the issue of introducing children to alcohol in the
home, 27% viewed this as a good idea while 63% disagreed with this practice. Eleven
per cent of parents reported that they had given a drink to their teenager at home.
Parents who drank regularly themselves, who were from higher socio-demographic
groups and who lived in the east of Ireland demonstrated more permissive attitudes to
teenage drinking.
Conclusions:
We found no evidence of widespread permissive attitudes and behaviours among Irish
parents. Given that parental influences have been demonstrated to exert substantial
impact on teenage drinking, it may be possible to harness the concerns of Irish parents
more effectively to reverse the trends of escalating alcohol related harm in Ireland
Sponsor
Grant Number
Health Research Board (HRB)
Author's Homepage:
http://people.tcd.ie/darkerchttp://people.tcd.ie/joebarry
http://people.tcd.ie/smythbo
http://people.tcd.ie/sllwrght
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PUBLISHEDType of material:
Journal ArticleSeries/Report no:
BMC Public Health10
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Full text availableKeywords:
Public Health, teenage drinkingDOI:
http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/1471-2458-10-297Metadata
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