2008 Woodie Awards
Binge drinking raises concerns
Michelle Sartor
Issue date: 12/9/04 Section: News
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Drinking, especially binge drinking is often linked to college campuses. Most people have heard of binge drinking, but may not know what it really is.
To help raise student awareness about binge drinking, students enrolled in Health Communication constructed a campaign entitled "You Think You Know But You Have No Idea" to educate students on the issue and make them think about their actions with respect to drinking.
On Monday, students involved in the campaign took shifts at a table in Seegers Union where they had a variety of materials related to binge drinking.
They had several pamphlets of information for people walking through, as well as candy, mocktails and a video they made.
The students also put signs along Academic Row containing facts and statistics about binge drinking and displayed empty alcohol containers they had collected from campus dumpsters on Sunday, Nov. 14 to show the amount of alcohol consumed in one weekend at the College.
According to the campaign's literature, binge drinking occurs when men consume five or more drinks in one sitting or women consume four or more drinks in one sitting.
The idea of one drink is also somewhat unclear to students who may tend to overestimate the amount of a serving size.
To help clarify this issue, the campaign's table had a game with four glasses set up.
Students had to indicate where they would fill each glass up with alcohol if they were drinking in a social situation.
Then the students running the campaign converted the amount indicated into serving sizes.
According to Dr. Susan Kahlenberg, Assistant Professor of Communication and instructor of Health Communication, the goal of this game was to help students see how much they are actually drinking.
Kahlenberg said oftentimes students will fill a glass to the top and may not realize that in reality, the are drinking the equivalent of nearly two servings of alcohol.
The students created a documentary video about binge drinking for the campaign, which ran continuously throughout the day.
To help raise student awareness about binge drinking, students enrolled in Health Communication constructed a campaign entitled "You Think You Know But You Have No Idea" to educate students on the issue and make them think about their actions with respect to drinking.
On Monday, students involved in the campaign took shifts at a table in Seegers Union where they had a variety of materials related to binge drinking.
They had several pamphlets of information for people walking through, as well as candy, mocktails and a video they made.
The students also put signs along Academic Row containing facts and statistics about binge drinking and displayed empty alcohol containers they had collected from campus dumpsters on Sunday, Nov. 14 to show the amount of alcohol consumed in one weekend at the College.
According to the campaign's literature, binge drinking occurs when men consume five or more drinks in one sitting or women consume four or more drinks in one sitting.
The idea of one drink is also somewhat unclear to students who may tend to overestimate the amount of a serving size.
To help clarify this issue, the campaign's table had a game with four glasses set up.
Students had to indicate where they would fill each glass up with alcohol if they were drinking in a social situation.
Then the students running the campaign converted the amount indicated into serving sizes.
According to Dr. Susan Kahlenberg, Assistant Professor of Communication and instructor of Health Communication, the goal of this game was to help students see how much they are actually drinking.
Kahlenberg said oftentimes students will fill a glass to the top and may not realize that in reality, the are drinking the equivalent of nearly two servings of alcohol.
The students created a documentary video about binge drinking for the campaign, which ran continuously throughout the day.