Underage Drinking: Prevention Programs/At Risk Youth Ryan Jordan, Jon Lang, Nicole Ficquette, Gail Villarreal, Meredith Grace Introduction: Although the rate has generally declined since the 1990’s, underage drinking remains a significant public health problem in the U.S. Alcohol is the most commonly used drug by young people under age 21. The 2008 Monitoring the Future survey showed that 55% of adolescents in grades 8, 10, 12 report having used alcohol. The Centers for Disease Control report that approximately 5000 young people die each year because of alcohol-related injuries. This study surveyed general psychology students to measure their prevalence of alcohol consumption as adolescents, their perceptions of the overall prevalence of underage drinking in the community, and the effectiveness of any alcohol education or prevention programs in which they participated. Method: The participants in this study were recruited from General Psychology students at Boise State University. An original survey consisting of 38 questions measuring the drinking behaviors, risk factors, prevention programs attended, and perceptions of underage drinking in their communities, was completed online using the Qualtrics program. Results: A total of 223 participants completed the survey with an average age of 22.4. Of this number, 36% reported alcoholism in their family. The number for parents allowing their kids to drink was very low; the mean on a scale of 1-5, one being never and five being always, the mean was 1.90. 91 of the 223 response answers indicated they were a part of what is considered an “at-risk” population, which includes single parents, low income , foster care, adopted , and being raised by a relative other than your parents .Of the 198 participants who answered that they had participated in some sort of prevention program the responses indicate that the information was somewhat to very informative (mean of 3.47), but also leaned toward being somewhat important (mean 3.98). Drinking habit of those surveyed were low, on school days the mean was 1.57, with 162 responding never. Current drinking habits were not much higher the mean being 2.50, most responses lying between once a month and less than once a month. However the perception of drinking in their community had as mean of 4.26, with 110 responses of very common. The discrepancy exists in the perception of drunk driving as well where the mean of how prevalent it was in your community was 3.40. Discussion: Our study confirmed our hypothesis that self-reported drinking habits would be low, while the perception of underage drinking habits in the community were high. The limitations of this study were the low number of participants and being limited to college students. It is our belief that understanding community perceptions and working to change those perceptions could lead to a decrease in underage drinking. ) or GRAPH or TABLE Psyc 489: Capstone, Spring 2010 Instructor Name: Dr. Linda Anooshian Community Partner Name: Caldwell High School, Treasure Valley Alcohol/Drug Coalition Community Partner’s Mission Statement: CHS - Propelling students and staff to excellence. TVADC - To provide leadership, education, resources, and direction to solve alcohol and drug problems. Their goal is to improve community safety and quality of life by reducing substance abuse. Service Project Purpose Help community agencies gain perceptive on underage drinking and perceptions of underage drinking among youth in the community. Learning goals: Applying psychological knowledge and research to issues in the real world. Reflection: Our study shows not only damage done by underage alcohol use and abuse but the damage of a skewed perception by underage drinkers. Originally, helping develop a project to help target effective teaching methods to at risk children that show the damages of underage drinking was our goal but after studying our data we have found that the perception of how prevalent alcohol use is in one’s community has a bigger impact than being in any of the programs we asked about. This survey may yield different results if given to a bigger population outside of just Psychology 101 students. The idea of preventing underage drinking in at risk children could potentially save millions of dollars and prevent lives from being ruined. PHOTO (highest resolution possible) or GRAPH or TABLE