Parents who drink 'will influence children to do same'
Children are likely to copy their parents' drinking habits, whether good or bad, it has been claimed.
The Department for Children, Families and Schools has commissioned a study which suggested children from heavy-drinking households are more likely to use alcohol themselves.
Additionally, the report found that half of young people who have drunk alcohol at some point were given it by their parents, a statistic which has raised concern among many experts, including Andrew McNeill, director of the Institute of Alcohol Studies.
He stated that the findings confirm what has been known for ages: "In general, but with some exceptions, children tend to become the sort of drinkers their parents were, though there is also a generational effect."
Mr McNeill pointed out that this is where a whole generation may tend to drink more, or less, than their parents because of changes in culture or affordability of alcohol, but that the current culture is definitely leaning towards greater consumption.
The DCFS study found that eight out of ten parents had no pre-planned strategies to tackle irresponsible drinking by their children, with one in four youngsters saying their parents had never talked to them about alcohol.
Mr McNeill said that the statistics are a concern, specifically the finding that one in ten parents have no idea whether their child has ever consumed alcohol.
"One point worth making is that this knocks the idea of forbidden fruit on the head. One of the exceptions is that some children of heavy/problem drinking parents react against it, and drink little or nothing themselves,"
However, the specialist stated that the children of parents who have a drinking problem do still have a raised risk regardless of their feelings on the subject.
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