For some time, college professionals and community leaders across the country have cited the probable existence of a link between problem behavior among students and easy access to cheap alcohol.

Now, documentation supporting this belief has been marshaled in a recent survey by the Harvard School of Public Health College Alcohol Study (CAS), which describes the extent to which the liquor industry targets college students through the sale of large-volume alcohol items, such as kegs, party balls and 24- and 30-can cases of beer.

The CAS survey, released in September, highlights research that indicates a strong association between the presence of large-volume liquor promotions and higher rates of on-campus drinking by college students, and many of the initiatives recommended in the national report are already under way in Delaware.

"The latest Harvard studies seem to confirm what we have been saying for some time," John Bishop, UD associate vice president for counseling and student development, says. "The lower the price of alcohol and the more extensive the drink specials--the more likely it is that college students will drink to excess."

The report also noted that while previous efforts to reduce alcohol-related problems on college campus have focused primarily on education and changes in student behavior, efforts to regulate marketing practices also may be important strategies.

"These recommendations about the regulation of marketing practices and the importance of strong enforcement make a great deal of sense," Bishop says. "In fact, the city of Newark, with input from the Building Responsibility Coalition (BRC), has already implemented some of the strategies identified by Wechsler."

Bishop says that this implementation includes a number of suggestions submitted by the Mayor's Alcohol Commission and acted on by Newark City Council, such as:

• Restricting "happy hours" to 4-9 p.m.;
  
  
• Limiting the type of banners that can be displayed to advertise drink specials;
  
  
• Adopting a 0.08 percent blood alcohol level for DUI offenses in the city of Newark, and prohibiting any "open containers" of alcohol in vehicles;
  
  
• Cracking down on underage drinking and the use of false IDs through the use of special ID scanners;
  
  
• Requiring restaurants with alcohol licenses to operate in a manner that emphasizes the serving of food instead of being saloons that only pretend to be restaurants; and
  
  
• Increasing by three the number of police officers who have specific responsibilities in enforcing the alcohol control ordinances, as well
  as the "cops-in-shops" program.

BRC also is in favor of a statewide keg registration law and would favor dram shop legislation at the state level, Bishop says. Dram shop liability laws hold alcohol servers responsible for harm that intoxicated or underage patrons cause others or themselves.

"These kinds of restrictions cannot be adopted only at a local level without putting local merchants at a competitive disadvantage," Bishop says.

According to the CAS report, previous research has indicated that underage students are responsible for consuming 48 percent of all alcohol consumed on college campuses.

"The prevalence of bars and liquor stores around college campuses is not a coincidence," Bishop says. "The alcohol industry obviously sees the college student population as a prime market, even though most students are underage."

Binge drinking, as defined by Henry Wechsler, principal investigator of the study and director of CAS, is the consumption of five or more drinks in a row at least once in the past two weeks for men and four or more drinks in a row for women. According to the study, research has shown that binge drinking is associated with "lower grades, vandalism and physical and sexual violence."

-- Jerry Rhodes