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Alcohol: Our Kid's Drug of Choice

This article first appeared as a publication of the Center on Alcohol Marketing and Youth, based in Washington D.C.

Alcohol is the most commonly used drug among America’s youth. More young people drink alcohol than smoke tobacco or use marijuana.

National Research Council/Institute of Medicine, 2004

  • Each day, more than 7,000 kids in the United States under age 16 take their first drink

  • 1 in 5 eighth-graders is a current drinker.

  • 1 in 5 youth, ages 12 to 20, binge drinks (5 or more drinks on one occasion).

  • Most kids drink to get drunk: more than 90 per cent of the alcohol consumed by 12 to 20-year-olds is drunk when they are bingeing.

Underage Drinking Harms and Kills Our Children
Alcohol use by children, adolescents, and young adults under the legal drinking age of 21 produces human tragedies with alarming regularity. National Research Council/Institute of Medicine, 2004

  • Each day, three teens in the United States die from drinking and driving, and at least six more die from other alcohol-related causes.

  • Teenage girls who binge drink are up to 63 per cent more likely to become teen mothers.

  • Underage drinking costs the United States $53 billion a year in medical care, lost productivity, and the pain and suffering of young drinkers.

Alcohol Advertising:
Reaching Kids Where They Live
While many factors may influence an underage person’s drinking decisions, including among other things parents, peers and the media, there is reason to believe that advertising also plays a role. Federal Trade Commission, 1999

  • A USA Today survey found that teens say alcohol ads have greater influence on the desire to drink in general than the desire to buy a particular brand.

  • A study published in The Journal of the American Medical Association found that the number of beer and distilled spirits ads tended to increase with a magazine’s youth readership. For every 1 million underage readers ages 12 to 19 in a magazine, researchers generally found 1.6 times more beer advertisements and 1.3 times more distilled spirits advertisements.

  • A study of children ages nine to 11 found that children were more familiar with Budweiser’s television frogs than Kellogg’s Tony the Tiger, the Mighty Morphin’ Power Rangers, or Smokey the Bear.

Institute of Medicine Calls for Industry Reforms and a Public Health Watchdog
In the committee’s opinion, alcohol companies should refrain from displaying commercial messages encouraging alcohol use to audiences known to include a significant number of children or teens when these messages are known to be highly attractive to young people. It is not enough for the company to say: “Because these messages also appeal to adults, who will predominate in the expected audience, we are within our legal rights.” National Research Council / Institute of Medicine (IOM), 2004

  • IOM called on the industry to move to a standard of not placing ads where underage youth are more than 15 per cent of the audience—the proportion of youth in the population.

  • IOM called on the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services to monitor alcohol advertising and report its findings to Congress and the public.

Why the Alcohol Industry’s 30 per cent Threshold Fails to Protect Youth
Because youth, ages 12 to 20, are only 13.3 per cent of the national TV viewing audience, the alcohol industry’s current threshold of not placing ads where underage youth are more than 30 per cent of the audience allows alcohol ads to be placed on programs where there are more than twice as many youth as in the viewing population.

CAMY Documents Youth Exposure to Alcohol Ads
Using standard advertising industry databases and methods, the Center on Alcohol Marketing and Youth (CAMY) at Georgetown University has documented widespread exposure of underage youth to alcohol ads and marketing on television, radio, and the Web and in magazines.

Alcohol Web Sites:
Cyber Playgrounds for Kids
Alcohol Web Sites Attract Large Numbers of Underage Youth

Alcohol company Web sites received nearly 700,000 in-depth visits – visits that went beyond the age-verification page on the site – from young people under the legal drinking age in the last six months of 2003 alone. In fact, 13.1 per cent of all in-depth visits to 55 alcohol Web sites were initiated by underage youth.

Games, Cartoons, Music and High-Tech Downloads Fill Alcohol Web Sites
Video games such as a waterballoon toss, pinball, car races, shooting aliens and air hockey, as well as customized music downloads and IM (instant messaging) accessories were found throughout alcohol company web sites, especially beer and distilled spirits Web sites.

No Effective “Carding” on the Internet
Alcohol industry marketing code hold out the promise of limiting access to only legal-age adults by working with the computer industry. However, underage youth have easy access to alcohol Web sites since the majority of parental control software programs are largely ineffective at preventing youth from visiting these sites. A CAMY report for 2003 showed that as many as 76 per cent of the alcohol brands eluded parental controls half the time or more.

CAMY Alcohol on the Web Report:
Clicking with Kids: Alcohol Marketing and Youth on theInternet
Available at www.camy.org.

Magazines:
Alcohol Marketing Reaches Youth
America’s youth saw far more alcoholic beverage advertising in magazines than did people of legal drinking age from 2001 to 2003 on a per capita basis.

Alcohol companies placed their ads in magazines with high youth readership, including Rolling Stone, Vibe, Maxim, InStyle and Sports Illustrated.

Magazines with High Youth Readership and Alcohol Advertising, 2001 to 2003

Rolling* Stone
Vibe*
Maxim
In
Style
Sports Illustrated
Average per cent youth readership
31.8
39.2
24.5
21.7
24.0
Total alcohol ad spending $m
45.9
15.1
67.6
24
123.4

*Composition and spending based on national editions.
Sources: TNS Media Intelligence/CMR, Mediamark Research Inc.

Between 2001 and 2003, alcohol companies spent $990.3 million to place ads in magazines. Distilled spirits advertising is especially prevalent in magazines because of the broadcast television networks’ voluntary ban on distilled spirits ads. During that time, distilled spirits advertisers accounted for 75 per cent of the dollars spent on alcohol advertising in magazines.

2001
2002
2003
Beverage tyupe
Ads
$m
Ads
$m
Ads
$m
Beer and Ale
292
30.5
291
33.9
465
54.8
Distilled Spirits
2840
254.3
2697
260.0
2330
228.2
Alcopops
73
6.9
96
10.2
29
3.0
Wine
411
28.5
514
38.8
417
39.9
Total
3616
320.2
3598
342.9
3241
325.9

Sources: TNS Media Intelligence/CMR, Mediamark Research Inc.

CAMY Magazine Reports:
Overexposed: Youth a Target of Alcohol Advertising in Magazines
Available at www.camy.org.

Sex Differences in Adolescent Exposure to Alcohol
Advertising in Magazines
Summary available at www.camy.org.

Alcohol Radio Ads:
Tuning in to Kids
In 14 of the 15 largest media markets CAMY studied in the summer of 2003, young people ages 12 to 20 heard more radio alcohol advertising per capita than adults over age 21. In five of these top 15 markets, underage youth also heard more radio alcohol advertising than young adults ages 21 to 34 on a per capita basis. In its study, CAMY analyzed more than 50,000 radio ads airing in 104 markets across the nation. CAMY’s analysis shows that 28 per cent of these airings occurred when underage youth were more than 30 per cent of the listening audience. According to revised industry marketing codes announced in September 2003, underage youth should not constitute more than 30 per cent – a change from 50 per cent – of the audience for alcohol ads.

CAMY Radio Reports:
Radio Daze: Alcohol Ads Tune in Underage Youth
Youth Exposure to Radio Advertising for Alcohol – United States, Summer 2003
Available at www.camy.org.

Girls & Alcohol Advertising:
Exposure to Alcohol Ads is a Girl Thing Too
Given the latest public health data on the closing ofthe gender gap in underage drinking, parents have even more reason to worry. Their daughters are being overwhelmed with alcohol ads portraying drinking as glamorous and fashionable.
David H. Jernigan, Ph.D., Research
Director, Center on Alcohol Marketing and Youth

A study conducted by CAMY and published in the Archives of Pediatrics & Adolescent Medicine found that in 2002, underage girls were even more overexposed to alcohol advertising in magazines than boys, and that girls saw more alcohol advertising in magazines than women age 21 and over. CAMY’s study found that underage girls saw 68 per cent more beer advertising than women, age 21 and over, on a per capita basis. The difference in overexposure was most striking for ads for alcopops: girls saw 95 per cent more advertising than legal-age women on a per capita basis.

African-American & HispanicYouth: No One Left Behind When It Comes to Kids & Alcohol Advertising
African-American Kids & AlcoholAdvertising
African-American youth have historically had lower rates of alcohol use and abuse thanother youth, and African- American communities have been proud of that. That is what makes the Center’s report striking and upsetting. African- American parents, teachers, health professionals and clergy do not need to have their hard work and success in protecting their children undermined by the alcohol industry’s advertising and marketing.
Dr. David Satcher, M.D., Director of the National Center for Primary Care, Morehouse School of Medicine, and former U.S. Surgeon General

  • Alcohol advertising was placed on television programs most popular with African-American youth. Alcohol advertisers spent $11.7 million in 2002 to place ads on all 15 of the programs most popular with African- American youth, including Bernie Mac, The Simpsons, King of the Hill, and My Wife and Kids.

  • Alcohol advertising in magazines and on the radio overexposed African-American youth. Compared to non-African- American youth, African-American youth saw 66 per cent more beer and ale advertising and 81 per cent more distilled spirits advertising in magazines in 2002. On radio, they heard 12 per cent more beer advertising and 56 per cent more ads for distilled spirits than non-African-American youth on a per capita basis.

Hispanic Youth & Alcohol Advertising
The Center found that Latino children were even more likely than other youth to see alcohol ads in English-language magazines, and more likely to hear distilled spirits and alcopop ads on the radio. … The alcohol companies need to do a better job of self-regulating and stop inappropriate advertising. The Institute of Medicine recommends that the industry move its ads to better ensure that adults are more likely to see, hear and read them than young people—an obvious solution that is long overdue.
U.S. Congresswoman Lucille Roybal-Allard and David H. Jernigan, La Opinion

  • Alcohol advertising was placed on a majority of the TV programs most popular with Hispanic youth. Alcohol advertisers spent $23.6 million to place ads on 12 of the 15 programs in English and Spanish that were most popular with Hispanic youth in 2002, including Las Vias delmor, Ver para Creer, That '70s Show, and MADtv.

  • Hispanic youth saw and heard even more alcohol advertising in magazines and on the radio than non-Hispanic youth. Hispanic youth saw 24 per cent more beer and ale and 24 per cent more distilled spirits advertising than non-Hispanic youth in Englishlanguage magazines in 2002. Hispanic youth heard 11 per cent more distilled spirits advertising and 14 per cent more advertising for alcopops on English-language radio than non-Hispanic youth on a per capita basis.

We consider the entire advertisement both racist and sexist. It strongly perpetuates derogatory stereotypes of Latinas.
Congressional Hispanic Caucus
CAMY Reports on African-American and Hispanic Youth Exposure:
Exposure of African-American Youth to Alcohol Advertising Exposure of Hispanic Youth to Alcohol Advertising
Available at www.camy.org.

Taking Action to Protect Our Kids
Growing concern about the continued high rates of underage drinking in the United States and the role played by alcohol industry advertising practices has pushed policymakers and communities to take action. Efforts to reduce the exposure of underage youth to alcohol advertising range from the introduction of legislation in Congress to the passage of local ordinances to the adoption of new state rules to the creation of task forces by state attorneys general. Here are examples of how policymakers and communities are trying to protect our youth:

  • The “Sober Truth on Preventing Underage Drinking Act,” or “STOP Underage Drinking Act,” was introduced on July 21, 2004 by a bipartisan group of U.S. senators and representatives. The STOP Underage Drinking Act employs many of the welltested policies and programs recommended in the Institute of Medicine’s September 2003 report to Congress. It funds measures that will reduce alcohol’s availability to teens, better enforce drinking laws, and provide more resources for local community efforts. It also funds a small pilot media campaign that could serve as a model for a national adult-oriented campaign to educate parents about this issue. It provides for public health monitoring of the amount of alcohol advertising reaching our youth.

  • Philadelphia’s City Council unanimously passed in December 2003 an ordinance banning future alcohol advertising on city-owned property. By adopting this ordinance, the City Council banned alcohol advertising from the public transit bus shelters used by many schoolchildren when traveling between school and home each day. The City of Philadelphia owns all public transit bus shelters and administers the seventh-largest public school system in the United States.

  • The State of Ohio adopted in May 2004 an administrative rule prohibiting alcohol billboards within 500 feet of schools, parks and churches. Previously, billboards could have been within 500 feet of a school, park or church as long as they were not visible from them. Ohio Parents for Drug Free Youth championed this reform and was supported by many other groups. While alcohol industry trade associations call for the 500-foot limit in their marketing codes, the Ohio rule is more specific, and makes the industry’s voluntary ban enforceable.

  • The National Association of Attorneys General created in the summer of 2004 the Youth Access to Alcohol Task Force to reduce underage drinking. The mission statement for the task force states: “The Task Force studies youth exposure to alcohol advertising and access to alcohol, educates state Attorneys General on ways to reduce access and change social norms about underage drinking, and partners with national and state entities to augment and enhance on-going efforts to stop underage drinking. The Task Force examines the alcohol industry’s marketing practices, including television, radio, Internet and print advertising, and the effectiveness of the industry’s self-monitoring programs, and works with the industry to reduce access. The Task Force compiles data on best practices related to liquor enforcement, legislative initiatives, parental education, and campus enforcement and education programs, and exchanges information among states regarding these programs and initiatives. The Task Force tracks Congressional and federal agency efforts to respond to the problem of underage drinking.”

To learn more about these initiatives and other actions being taken to reduce underage youth exposure to alcohol
advertising, visit: www.camy.org/action/.