Abstract
Alcohol use among adolescents is a major social and public health issue in Western countries (WHO, Adolescent alcohol-related behaviours: Trends and inequalities in the WHO European region, 2002–2014. Geneva, Switzerland, 2018). Concern about young people’s alcohol use had prompted a large number of quantitative studies of drinking practices and their correlates that have generated important knowledge: however, some important gaps in our knowledge remain. After explaining the main limitations with existing research, the present chapter suggests how a cultural approach focused on young people’s attitude towards alcohol can help to bridge these gaps. This aim is pursued by drawing from the results of a large body of comparative qualitative studies that explored cultural differences in drinking between youth in Finland and Italy. After providing arguments for why these countries can be considered paradigmatic cases of traditional drinking cultures, the chapter elaborates on the role of these cultures in shaping the attitudes of young people towards drinking starting from early images of alcohol and related emotions that are formed during childhood. Then adolescents’ conceptualisations of alcohol-related risks, addiction and binge drinking and young adults’ conceptualisation of appropriate and inappropriate drinking for young people and adults are analysed. At the end of the chapter the data presented are interpreted at the light of broader societal values and family relationships characterising different geographies, suggesting that a major emphasis on collective and familiar aims and responsibilities acts as a protective factor with regard to youth drinking.
Keywords
- Youth drinking cultures
- Alcohol socialisation process
- Qualitative methods
- Comparative research
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Notes
- 1.
Because different age ranges were used for groups in Italy (17–20; 37–40; 52–55; 67–70) and Finland (17–24; 25–32; 41–48; 57–64) we refer to group names to allow for comparison.
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Rolando, S., Beccaria, F. (2021). Adolescent Perceptions of Alcohol Consumption: A Cultural Approach. In: Cooke, R., Conroy, D., Davies, E.L., Hagger, M.S., de Visser, R.O. (eds) The Palgrave Handbook of Psychological Perspectives on Alcohol Consumption. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-66941-6_16
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