In Australia we all know that the legal age to drink alcohol is 18, but does that really stop underage drinking? Underage drinking is becoming a serious problem within Australia and although laws have been enforced there has still been an increase in teen drinking. Teenagers see drinking as a ‘night to have fun’ without realising how harmful it can actually be. Adolescents experiment with alcohol for a vast amount of different reasons, whether that is to fit in, because of depression/low self-esteem or just because they want to try it. Sometimes teenagers try it once or a few times and stop, whilst others grow a strong liking to it and continue, many of which drink heavily on a weekly basis. Statistics show that those teens with family members who have problems with alcohol or other drugs are more likely to have serious substance problems and teenagers who aren’t connected to or valued by their parent as well as those with poor self-esteem, emotional or mental health problems are also as great risk. …show more content…
But what about the negative sides to alcohol? We’re always told how alcohol damages the brain cells of adolescents but when mentioning it to teenagers it just goes in one ear and out the other without them thinking twice about it, and their mind set is to just do what everyone else is doing – drinking. The negative effects of alcohol are traumatising and shouldn’t be something that school kids should be facing, so I’m sure I’m not alone in this when I say: there needs to be a dramatic