Why 21
Why is 21 the Minimum Legal Drinking Age (MLDA)?
Many activities have ages of initiation. A person must wait until age 16 to start driving, age 18 to marry without parental consent, age 35 to become president and so on.
The age limit for alcohol is based on research which shows that young people react differently to alcohol. Teens get drunk twice as fast as adults, 9 but have more trouble knowing when to stop. Teens naturally overdo it and binge more often than adults.
Enforcing the legal drinking age of 21 reduces traffic crashes involving drunk teens, 4-6 protects young people’s maturing brains,12,14 and keeps young people safer overall.
References
4. Fell, J.; “Minimum Legal Drinking Age Policy Knowledge Asset,” website created by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation’s Substance Abuse Policy Research Program; March 2009.
6. National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, National Center for Statistics and Analysis “Lives Saved in 2012 by Restraint Use and Minimum Drinking Age Laws” DOT HS 811 851 A Brief Statistical Summary 2013. Read More
12. Shults, Ruth A., Elder, Randy W., Sleet, David A., Nichols, James L., Alao, Mary O. Carande-Kulis, Vilma G., Zaza, Stephanie, Sosin, Daniel M., Thompson, Robert S., and the Task Force on Community Preventive Services. “Reviews of Evidence Regarding Interventions to Reduce Alcohol-Impaired Driving.” Am J Prev Med 2001;21(4S). Read More
14. Zeigler DW, Wang CC, Yoast RA, Dickinson BD, Mccaffree MA, Robinowitz CB, et al. The Neurocognitive Effects of Alcohol on Adolescents and College Students. Prev Med 2005 Jan;40(1):23-32. Read More
Children as young as nine years old already start viewing alcohol in a more positive way, and approximately 3,300 kids as young as 12 try marijuana each day.
References
Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration. (2018). Key substance use and mental health indicators in the United States: Results from the 2017 National Survey on Drug Use and Health (HHS Publication No. SMA 18-5068, NSDUH Series H-53). Rockville, MD: Center for Behavioral Health Statistics and Quality, Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration.
About 30 percent of 8th graders have tried alcohol.
References
Johnston, L. D., Miech, R. A., O’Malley, P. M., Bachman, J. G., Schulenberg, J. E., & Patrick, M. E. (2020). Monitoring the Future national survey results on drug use 1975-2019: Overview, key findings on adolescent drug use. Ann Arbor: Institute for Social Research, University of Michigan.
Youth who start drinking before age 15 years are six times more likely to develop alcohol dependence or abuse later in life than those who begin drinking at or after age 21 years.
References
Center for Behavioral Health Statistics and Quality. 2015 National Survey on Drug Use and Health: Detailed Tables. Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration, Rockville, MD; 2016.
References Lopez-Quintero, C, et al. (2011). Probability and predictors of transition from first use to dependence on nicotine, alcohol, cannabis, and cocaine: results of the National Epidemiologic Survey on Alcohol and Related Conditions (NESARC). Drug Alcohol Depend. 115(1-2): p. 120-30
References Mallett, K.A., Turrisi, R., Hultgren, B.A., Sell, N., Reavy, R., & Cleveland, M. (2017). When alcohol is only part of the problem: An event-level analysis of negative consequences related to alcohol and other substance use. Psychology of Addictive Behaviors, 31(3), 307-314. PMCID: PMC5422123.
3. Fell, James. From “Chapter 2: Federalism: Resolved, the Federal Government should restore each State’s freedom to set its drinking age.” in Ellis, Richard and Nelson, Michael (eds.) Debating Reform. CQPress Publishers, Fall 2009.
Some states permit parents to do this with their own child (rarely, if ever, with someone else’s child), but there’s no evidence that this approach actually works.3 As matter of fact, there is evidence to contrary. When teens feel they have their parents’ approval to drink, they do it more and more often when they are not with their parents. When parents have concrete, enforced rules about alcohol, according to binge drinking statistics, young people binge drink less. However, kids who are simply more connected with their parents, for example, who attend family dinners more frequently, are less likely to drink alcohol or use other drugs among other risk factors.7
References
3. Fell, James. From “Chapter 2: Federalism: Resolved, the Federal Government should restore each State’s freedom to set its drinking age.” in Ellis, Richard and Nelson, Michael (eds.) Debating Reform. CQPress Publishers, Fall 2009.
7. Fulkerson, J.A., Story, M., Mellin, A., Leffert, N., Neumark-Sztainer, D., & French, S.A. (2006). Family Dinner Meal Frequency and Adolescent Development: Relationships with Developmental Assets and High-Risk Behaviors. Journal of Adolescent Health, 39(3), 337-345.; Eisenberg, M.E., Neumark-Sztainer, D., Fulkerson, J.A., & Story, M. (2008). Family meals and substance use: is there a long-term protective association? Journal of Adolescent Health, 43(2), 151-156.; Fulkerson, J.A., Kubik, M.Y., Story, M., Lytle, L., & Arcan, C. (2009). Are there nutritional and other benefits associated with family meals among at-risk youth? Journal of Adolescent Health, 45(4), 389-395.; Skeer, M.R., & Ballard, E.L. (2013). Are family meals as good for youth as we think they are? A review of the literature on family meals as they pertain to adolescents’ risk prevention. Journal of Youth and Adolescence, 42(7), 943-963; Perasso, G., Carone, N., Health Behavior in School Aged Children Lombardy Group 2014, & Barone, L. (2019). Alcohol consumption in adolescence: the role of adolecents’ gender, parental control, and family dinners attendance in an Italian HBSC sample. Journal of Family Studies, 1-13.
History of the Minimum Legal Drinking Age Act
On July 17, 1984, President Ronald Reagan signed the Minimum Legal Drinking Age-21 Law, alongside drunk driving victims and survivors from MADD, then-U.S. Transportation Secretary Elizabeth Dole, and Congressional sponsors. Over the last four decades, this landmark federal law has served as a blueprint for MADD’s efforts to end impaired driving.
The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) estimates approximately 800 to 900 lives are saved every year as a result of setting the minimum legal drinking age in the U.S. at 21.
Myth & Facts
There are many unfortunate and dangerous myths when it comes to underage use of alcohol and other drugs. Click on each myth below to learn the truth and the facts that support it.
False. One of MADD’s pillars is promoting zero tolerance for underage drinking.
Kids who start drinking young are seven times more likely to be in an alcohol-related crash according to underage drinking statistics. MADD knows that by preventing underage drinking today, we can end drunk driving tomorrow.
References
Hingson, Ralph, et al. “Age of Drinking Onset, Driving After Drinking, and Involvement in Alcohol-Related Motor Vehicle Crashes.” DOT HS 809 188. Washington, DC: National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, January 2001. Read More
Actually, in Europe, young people have higher intoxication rates than in the United States, and less than a quarter had lower or equivalent rates to the United States. Also, a greater percentage of young people in the majority of Europe report binge drinking at higher rates than compared to their US counterparts.1-2 Most European youth have higher rates of alcohol-related problems because of their heavy drinking.
Perhaps the best example of fact versus myth is what happened in New Zealand. In 1999, New Zealand lowered its purchase age from 20 to 18. Not only did drunk driving crashes increase, but youth started to drink earlier, binge drinking escalated, and in the 12 months following the decrease in legal drinking age, there was a 50 percent increase in drunk teens, 18- and 19-year-old patients, at the Auckland Hospital emergency room.3
References
1. The ESPAD Report 2003. Alcohol and Other Drug Use Among Students in 35 European Countries. Published 2004. Read excerpts here.
2. Johnston, L. D., O’Malley, P. M., Bachman, J. G., & Schulenberg, J. E. (2004). Monitoring the Future national results on adolescent drug use: Overview of key findings, 2003 (NIH Publication No. 04-5506). Bethesda, MD: National Institute on Drug Abuse. Read the overview here.
3. Kyrpi, Kypros, et al. “Minimum Purchasing Age for Alcohol and Traffic Crash Injuries Among 15- to 19-Year-Olds in New Zealand.” American Journal of Public Health, January 2006, Voi 96, No. 1. Read the study here.
References Sacks JJ, Gonzales KR, Bouchery EE, Tomedi LE, Brewer RD. 2010 National and State Costs of Excessive Alcohol Consumption. Am J Prev Med 2015; 49(5):e73–e79. Read More
When the “forbidden fruit” is no longer forbidden, youth simply drink more. In states where the drinking age was 18, teens statistically drank more than in states where the minimum drinking age was 21. They continued to drink more as adults in their early 20s.4
References
4. Maisto, S.A., & Rachal, J.V. (1980). Indications of the relationship between adolescent drinking practices, related behaviors, and drinking age law: An examination of data from a national sample. In H. Wechsler (Ed.), Minimum drinking age laws: An evaluation (pp.155-176). Lexington, MA: D.C. Heath & Co. Read More
Many youth drink with the goal to get drunk. They are not “wired” in the brain to assess risk and to be responsible when it comes to risky behavior. There is no class or situation that will prompt a teen to drink responsibly when alcohol flows freely.
Actually, many don’t. In fact, the earlier someone begins drinking, the more likely they are to be alcohol dependent in later life. More than 40 percent of individuals who start drinking before the age of 13 will develop alcohol abuse or alcohol dependence at some point in their lives.5 Ninety-five percent of the 14 million people who are alcohol dependent began drinking before the legal age of 21.6
References
5. Grant, Bridgett and Deborah Dawson. “Age at Onset of Alcohol Use and Its Association with DSM-IV Alcohol Abuse and Dependence.” Results from the National Longitudinal Alcohol Epidemiologic Survey. Journal of Substance Abuse 9 (1997): 103-110.
6. Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration. “Alcohol Dependence or Abuse and Age at First Use.” Washington, DC: Department of Health and Human Services, Office of Applied Studies, October 22, 2004. Read the full study here.
21 is the minimum age because a person’s brain does not stop developing until his or her early to mid-20s. Drinking alcohol while the brain is still developing can lead to long-lasting deficits in cognitive abilities, including learning and memory.
Alcohol use by those under 21 is also related to numerous health problems including injuries and death resulting from alcohol poisoning, car crashes, suicide, homicide, assaults, drowning, and recreational mishaps. Not to mention that the early onset of drinking by youth significantly increases the risk of future health problems such as addiction.
Regardless of a person’s profession, underage drinking is still dangerous and unsafe. It is a fact based on biology not maturity or service to our country.
References
How alcohol affects brain: https://pubs.niaaa.nih.gov/publications/aa63/aa63.htm
Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration. “Alcohol Dependence or Abuse and Age at First Use.” Washington, DC: Department of Health and Human Services, Office of Applied Studies, October 22, 2004. Read the full study here.
Marijuana is very addictive! In fact, in 2016 over 4 million people were diagnosed with substance use disorder due to marijuana use. Marijuana that is produced and sold now has a much higher content of THC than what was seen on the market in the 60’s and 70’s. Just like with alcohol, the young brain is not ready to protect teens against drugs like marijuana.
References
Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration. (2017). Key substance use and mental health indicators in the United States: Results from the 2016 National Survey on Drug Use and Health (HHS Publication No. SMA 17-5044, NSDUH Series H-52). Rockville, MD: Center for Behavioral Health Statistics and Quality, Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration. Retrieved from https://www.samhsa.gov/data/
Citation: NIDA. Marijuana. National Institute on Drug Abuse website.
https://www.drugabuse.gov/publications/drugfacts/marijuana. Updated August 1, 2017.
You Can Help Prevent Child and Teen Substance Abuse
People who start drinking or doing drugs at an early age can face severe, persistent problems throughout their lives. Whether you are a parent or a teen, you have the power to make a difference.