Posted on July 15, 2010

The ongoing problem of teens indulging in drink and drugs often fines parents beside themselves trying to figure out where they may have gone wrong and how to fix the problem moving forward. Unfortunately, according to one study, parents don’t have as much influence as they once thought.

This study was recently featured in a Science Daily release and it did hold some good news for parents. First the bad news defined – parents don’t have as much influence as they once thought when it comes to whether or not their teen will try alcohol. The good news – they can have a significant impact when it comes to heavy drinking.

Conducted by a group at Brigham Young University, this study identified parenting styles that could strongly and directly affect teens in terms of heavy drinking. In examining 5,000 adolescents, researchers determined that teens with parents who scored high on accountability and warmth were the least prone to heavy drinking.

Parents who are identified as indulgent were also low on accountability and high on warmth. This parenting style tended to nearly triple the risk of teens participating in heavy drinking activities. When parents were considered strict – high on accountability and low on warmth – teens were more than twice as likely to drink heavily.

While a number of studies have examined the relationship between parents and drinking, this is one of the first to separate consumption and heavy drinking. Parents still don’t have much affect on whether or not their teen will try that first drink; but they can significantly impact whether or not the individual takes it to the next level.