Study Looks At College Kids, Binge Drinking

Hartford Courant (Hartford, CT) April 3, 2011 "For all the studies on alcohol abuse in college, researchers still have questions about it: What are the long-term effects of drinking in school? How does binge drinking affect the brain? Why do some students who drink heavily in college have no drinking problems later in life, while others do? These are among the questions being explored in an ongoing study at three Connecticut colleges on binge drinking among college students. Researchers at Trinity College, Yale University and Central Connecticut State University have completed three years of the five-year study and were to present some of their findings so far at the annual Cognitive Neuroscience Society meeting in San Francisco this past weekend. The Brain and Alcohol Research with College Students (BARCS) study, funded with a $3 million grant from the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism, has more than 2,000 students as subjects from Trinity and CCSU. Students in their first years are surveyed about their drinking habits and their family's drinking habits. A saliva sample is taken to allow researchers to examine genetic material." Read More