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Brad,
ITs not a matter of trying to destroy his studies, although I do have a problem with people that use these studies as arguments without reading the original text. When a person hears
or reads about studies its like playing the game telephone, the farther you are removed the less reliable the message. Plus its really hard to analyze the study if you don’t have it in front of you.
Lets assume his statistics are valid and lets discount the idea that the study may have been designed to find the results that it did.
There are three really basic ideas presented. These are in no particular order. One is the percentage of binge drinkers. Two is the amount of what is labeled unacceptable behaviors associated with drinking. And three is the definition of what actually
constitutes a binge drinker.
Lets start with the overall impression that the study gives and has been used in platforms
against college drinking . When I read the arguments I receive the impresion that alcohol
causes extreme behaviors, and many of them are anti-social ranging from sexual assault
to playing your stereo too loud. I get the impression that binge drinking is the cause of
this, and that a vast amount of people are responsible for these behaviors through binge
drinking (40% or so), and that binge drinking (bad drinking and bad behaviors) are
caused by people that drink 5 drinks (or more) in any given evening regardless of time
frame, tolerance, or body weight.
The biggest thing he has done is label binge drinking at 5 drinks. I currently weigh 250
pounds at approximately 15 percent body fat. I inclue body fat percentage because fat
weight doesn’t significantly increase alcohol tolerance. Which is why women will often
have a lesser tolerance for alcohol, not just because they weigh less, but their body fat
percentages or generally much higher than men’s.
5 drinks in two hours would not have me legally drunk. In fact it would take 14 drinks in
two hours to give me the .2 blood alcohol level that the guest of Kappa Sigma had that
fell out of the window.
If he really is associating binge drinking with risky behaviors, then in order to have
more credibility he would have to redefine it with more drinks, or qualify it with body
wieght, time frame or other factors. But if he did that it would be likely that his
percentage of binge drinking would go down significantly and would not cause such a
sensation.
Because, if 5 drinks in a given evening is not likely to be the cause of the anti-social
behaviors he blames on binge drinking, then the issue itself is no where near as severe as
it is being portrayed.
That is the point of reading the study critically, not to find fault with his statistics, but to
question the central premise.
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