A Study on How Binge Drinking Can Affect Decision Making

Binge drinking, typically associated with collegebetween activities.
students, may lead to poor decision making.Researchers are already aware that alcoholics have
The results of a new study published in the June issuepoorer neurocognitive functioning, including decision
of Alcoholism: Clinical & Experimental Researchmaking, than do non-alcoholics. However, there are
suggest that among college students, those who bingefew studies about how heavy drinking by those who
drink often exhibit poor decision making . Jenny Larkins,are not actually addicted to alchohol (binge drinkers)
a graduate student in clinical psychology at theaffects decision making. Researchers examined 200
University of Missouri, claims that alcoholics make poorstudents in four subgroups based on different
decisions such as those involving short-term rewardsbinge-drinking lifestyles from pre-college to the
coupled with long-term losses. The problems weresophomore year. These included low-binge drinkers,
associated with mental skills such planning for thestable moderate-binge drinkers, increasing binge
future, abstract reasoning, inhibiting or delayingdrinkers, and stable high-binge drinkers.
responses, doing two things at once and shifting