The Authors’ Own Words: Intoxication and Binge and High-Intensity Drinking Among US Young Adults in Their Mid-Twenties

The Authors’ Own Words: We ask authors to describe their impressions regarding the implications of their accepted work, how their findings will change practice, and what is noteworthy about the work.

“The likelihood of discussing alcohol use with a doctor or other health professional has been shown to decrease sharply after age 24, but empirical studies of high-risk alcohol use among this group have not been available to indicate if such decreased clinician communication overall is warranted. Our study, which estimated the prevalence of a range of alcohol use behaviors among US young adults aged 25/26, found that 39.9% of these young adults reported being intoxicated at least once in the past 30 days and 25.6% reported usually experiencing a sustained high of 3 or more hours when drinking alcohol. In the past two weeks, binge drinking (5+ drinks in a row) was reported by 36.3% of respondents, and 12.4% reported high-intensity drinking (10+ drinks in a row). These rates of age 25/26 alcohol use remained stable over the ten years of data examined, in contrast to significant declines over historical time in alcohol prevalence rates among these same individuals at age 18. Results suggest that high-risk alcohol use prevention approaches to reach young adults in their mid-twenties are needed, as are efforts to increase proactive screening to identify young adults participating in high-risk alcohol use.”