Advertisements of scantily clad women and hunks chilling out on a hot summer day with a nice cold bottle of beer may be aimed at young adults, but they're also having an impact on teens, and boosting their urge to drink.
The finding is based on a study conducted by researchers at the University of Florida and University of Florida who found that adolescents attending schools in neighbourhoods where alcohol ads litter the landscape tend to want to drink more and, compared with other children, have more positive views of alcohol.
As a part of their study the researchers counted the number of alcohol ads within a two-block radius of 63 Chicago schools and compared students' opinions on drinking when they were in sixth grade and again two years later.
They found that the more ads for alcohol there were in a neighbourhood, the more students were interested in drinking alcohol.
What's more, is the fact that the majority of the ads were only brand information, which are not thought to be as powerful.
"The majority of the ads were just brand information only. Sometimes we think that those as are not so powerful, but the majority of the ads we found were those kinds of ads and still we found the association with increased intentions to use alcohol," said UF epidemiologist Kelli A. Komro, Ph.D.
Teens who start drinking early at around the age of 15 are more likely to have trouble in school, become addicted to alcohol, smoke cigarettes and use drugs than adolescents who don't drink.
Prior research has shown that adolescents' intentions and attitudes about alcohol generally predict their later behaviour.
To gauge students' thoughts on drinking, the researchers asked them a series of questions, such as whether they planned on drinking in high school or if they thought drinking made teens popular.
By eighth grade when they are in the age group of 13 to
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