This Literature review paper is about underage drinking and driving and the truth behind

it. It goes into depth on how the drinking age in the United States effects the youth when they
visit other countries who have the drinking ages lower then in the U.S. It also answers the
question if binge drinking has more impact on a persons health at a younger age such as 12-16 vs
the ages of 15-21? It tells what the government is doing to prevent underage drinking in the
United States. This paper gives history background about underage drinking such as, did you
know that before 1984 there was no such thinking as a drinking age in the United States. It also
gives a brief description about Drunk Driving for example how 33% out of 33,000 people died in
a drunk driving accident. Now a days teens want to feel older, be "cool" and try new things
without knowing the reality of the consequences of alcohol.

Related Literature

Tracer study is an approach which widely being used in most organization especially in
the educational institutions to track and to keep record of their students once they have graduated
from the institution. Through tracer study, an institution able to evaluate the quality of education
given to their graduates by knowing the graduates placements and positions in the society which
later can be used as a benchmark in producing more qualified and competitive graduates. There
are books that we can use as a tool for studying different aspects of education and for studying
the present topic which is “A Tracer Study on The Employment Status of AB Journalism
Graduates Batches 2009-2012.

In the book Employment and Career Opportunities after Graduation by Arcelo and
Sanyal, the existence of a huge number of educated unemployed can lead to a certain amount of
political instability in a country, for they being among the educated class and knowledgeable
about the privileges society can offer, feel doubly deprived. In this matter, the analysis of the
unemployment situation in the Philippines shown that the young graduates is still in the job-
hunting stage.1This book is concerned to the graduates of AB Journalism that will be hunting
jobs after they graduated.

Just about everyone knows that the legal drinking age throughout the United States is 21.
But according to the National Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse, almost 80% of high
school students have tried alcohol.

Deciding whether to drink is a personal decision that we each eventually have to make.
This article provides some information on alcohol, including how it affects your body, so you
can make an educated choice.

Alcohol is created when grains, fruits, or vegetables are fermented. Fermentation is a

process that uses yeast or bacteria to change the sugars in the food into alcohol. Fermentation is
used to produce many necessary items — everything from cheese to medications. Alcohol has
different forms and can be used as a cleaner, an antiseptic, or a sedative.
 So if alcohol is a natural product, why do teens need to be concerned about drinking it?
When people drink alcohol, it's absorbed into their bloodstream. From there, it affects the central
nervous system (the brain and spinal cord), which controls virtually all body functions. Because
experts now know that the human brain is still developing during our teens, scientists are
researching the effects drinking alcohol can have on the teen brain.

Alcohol is a depressant, which means it slows the function of the central nervous
system. Alcohol actually blocks some of the messages trying to get to the brain. This alters a
person's perceptions, emotions, movement, vision, and hearing.
In very small amounts, alcohol can help a person feel more relaxed or less anxious. More alcohol
causes greater changes in the brain, resulting in intoxication. People who have overused alcohol
may stagger, lose their coordination, and slur their speech. They will probably be confused and
disoriented. Depending on the person, intoxication can make someone very friendly and talkative
or very aggressive and angry. Reaction times are slowed dramatically — which is why people
are told not to drink and drive. People who are intoxicated may think they're moving properly
when they're not. They may act totally out of character.
When large amounts of alcohol are consumed in a short period of time, alcohol
poisoning can result. Alcohol poisoning is exactly what it sounds like — the body has become
poisoned by large amounts of alcohol. Violent vomiting is usually the first symptom of alcohol
poisoning. Extreme sleepiness, unconsciousness, difficulty breathing, dangerously low blood
sugar, seizures, and even death may result.

The Internet is full of mixed messages about alcohol. On the one hand, moderate amounts
have been linked to health benefits. On the other, it is addictive and highly toxic — especially
when you drink too much. The truth is that the health effects of alcohol vary between individuals
and depend on the amount and type of alcohol consumed. This article discusses how alcohol
affects your health.

Humans have been drinking fermented concoctions since the beginning of recorded time.
But despite that long relationship with alcohol, we still don’t know what exactly the molecule
does to our brains to create a feeling of intoxication. Likewise, though the health harms of heavy
drinking are fairly obvious, scientists have struggled to identify what negative impacts lesser
volumes may lead to. Last September, the prestigious peer-reviewed British medical journal The
Lancet published a study that is thought to be the most comprehensive global analysis of the
risks of alcohol consumption. Its conclusion, which the media widely reported, sounded
unequivocal: “The safest level of drinking is none.”

Scientific studies are written primarily for other scientists. But to make informed
decisions, members of the general public have to engage with them, too. Does our current
method of doing so — study by study, conclusion by conclusion — make us more informed as
readers or simply more mistrustful? As Steneck asks: “If we turn our back on all research results,
how do we make decisions? How do you know what research to trust?” It’s a question this new
monthly column aims to explore: What can, and can’t, studies tell us when it comes to our
health?

The truth is, putting alcohol research in context is tricky even for scientists. The Lancet
study is epidemiological, which means it looks for patterns in data related to the health of entire
populations. That data might come from surveys or public records that describe how people
behave in their everyday environments, settings that scientists cannot absolutely control.
Epidemiological studies are a crucial means of discovering possible relationships between
variables and how they change over time. (Hippocrates founded the field when he posited an
environmental rather than a supernatural cause for malaria, which, he noted, occurred most often
in swampy areas.) They can include millions of people, far more than could be entered into a
randomized-control trial. And they are an ethical way to study risky behaviors: You can’t
experiment by randomly assigning groups of people to drive drunk or sober for a year. But
because epidemiologists can only observe — not control — the conditions in which their
subjects behave, there are also a vast and an unknown number of variables acting on those
subjects, which means such studies can’t say for certain that one variable causes another.

The Reality of Underage Drinking and Driving: A Review of the Literature

The drinking of alcoholic beverages has dated back to the 1600’s and has been drunk
since even before the United States. It has been used for things such as celebrations, enjoyment
and “pick-me-ups” after a bad day. The pros and cons of alcohol consumption have always been
looked at in developing the drinking age in the United States. The age of 21 has been in place for
many years because the United States government believes that, that age is what is safest for the
citizens. During the past couple of years the question of lowering the drinking age has been
thought of. Year after year, the age goes down of when teens take their first sips of alcohol.
Teens are simply drinking to seem “cool” and getting themselves into trouble. Due to underage
drinking, drinking and driving has turned into the number one cause of teen death (Vance). There
has been talk that by lowering the drinking age to 18, the government can prevent the sneaking
around and the driving while intoxicated that teens do to avoid getting in trouble by their parents.
Back when the National Minimum Drinking Age Act of 1984 was first passed people didn’t
really think much of it. It wasn’t as enforced as it is now. Various questions, such as the
following, have developed in order to discuss the effect of the drinking age around the world.
Conclusion

The view has on drinking and driving is very diverse. There are people who believe that
changing the drinking age will make it safer for everyone by allowing teens to experience
drinking in a safe environment of their legal guardians but by doing so people possibly could
jeopardize their brain development. Until more in-depth research, the drinking age will remain
21 leaving the rest in the governments hand to decide the next steps.

Reference

Crowne, A. (2012). Juvenile Justice Bulletin: Effects and Consequences of Underage

Drinking Retrieved from U.S. Department of Justice, Working for Youth Justice and Safety
website: www.ojjdp.gov/pubs/237145.pdf