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Example research essay topic: Age Of 21 18 Years Of Age - 1,980 words

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For thousands of years alcohol has been regarded by society as a temporary escape from reality and the tensions of everyday life. People use alcohol to reduce stress, to relax, and to enjoy a good evening. This should be the real purpose of alcohol drinking. This is the way in which alcohol should be looked upon.

There should be no reason for alcohol drinking to be looked upon as negative action. Drinking alcohol however, is in fact regarded as a negative action by society and the government. This is not because of the action drinking alcohol itself but actually because of the abuse people undertake with such an action. Alcohol reduces the ability of a human being to undergo the basic and every day thought processes, in such a way impeding a person under the influence of alcohol to engage in regular and everyday events.

Arguably, the problem of alcohol drinking counts for one of the largest threats to human life in the world. This is due to the high number of fatalities occurring from alcohol related murders, fights, and most of all- traffic accidents. Alcohol abuse impairs a humans ability to drive a vehicle and consequently creates simple grounds for death from a car collision. In the United States alone, drinking and driving accidents account for the number one cause of death among all age groups, mainly however, young adults and late teenagers. Youth in the United States is suffering from a high number of fatalities and injuries caused from falls, burns, crashes, drowning, violence, suicide, and poisoning- where the highest percentage of these accidents are related to alcohol. Due to the fact that alcohol abuse is such a high cause for morbidity and injury, governments and societies of countries all over the world concentrate on different techniques and methods in which to decrease these regrettable incidents.

The problem is however, alcohol cannot be completely abolished. Drinking alcohol has formed such a large part of life and society that it is too late for a complete elimination. The only thing that can be done is to find ways in which to decrease its consumption. As far as decreasing drinking abuse in general, there are two main controlling points: education and the legal drinking age. Most countries have different drinking ages, most ranging from 18 to 21. The United States has a drinking age of 21 but certainly, in juxtaposition to other countries, does not have the least alcohol consumption per capita.

The best things that governments and societies can use to decrease alcohol consumption are these two controlling points mentioned above (Wood 47). Drinking age, in a large part is correlated to maturity. When a person is believed to be mature, this person can be said to have the ability to take on privileges and responsibilities only a mature person can handle. One of these is the drinking of alcohol. Therefore, the best age for the legal privilege for drinking alcohol is that where an average person is said to be mature- 18 years of age. The United States has been trying to eliminate alcohol abuse ever since the 1850 s when some of the states declared a law of complete abolishment for alcohol.

Because of the highly negative results which this law provided, the law had to be eliminated. Once again in 1920, the United States declared complete abolishment but this time for the whole nation. This produced public demonstrations, economic failure, and most importantly, drug consumption went up dramatically. Most people stopped drinking alcohol but referred to even worse addictive drugs such as marijuana and cocaine. Finally, this law had to be eliminated and the drinking age remained 18 until 1984 when the drinking age was declared to be 21.

So far, over 15 years have gone by and the results do not seem to be very positive. A question that many people explore is that of why 21? The government of the United States has in many occasions referred to psychological research and used these tests as a way to declare the average maturity age. From these, the average maturity level was found to be 18 years of age (Presley et al. 190).

Because of this, the United States used 18 years as the legal minimum for all of the privileges and responsibilities which could only be handed to mature people. They did not however, declare drinking age as one of these privileges and for this reason declared the legal minimum for alcohol consumption to be 21; Without any determined reason. None of the reasons given for this has ever been effective enough as to prove a real claim. Research has been provided to the government and to media representatives which provided with very positive results ever since the 1980 s. These results represented a decline in alcohol consumption since the start of the decade of the 80 s. Also, there was a decrease in the amount of car crashes involving alcohol and a decrease in the amount of alcohol consumed per capita (Presley et al. 150).

This decrease in the amount of alcohol consumption though, cannot be said to be due to the raise in the drinking age because they started in the early 1980 s, not in 1984 or later. Therefore, this decline is not due to the raise of the drinking age but only to the realization of people as to the harm of alcohol and other factors such as education, concern from society, designated driver programs, increased seat belt and air bag usage, safer cars, lower speed limits, free taxi services from drinking establishments, among others. This research however, did also produce some negative outcomes. The research showed that there was an increase in the amount of alcohol intoxications and other problems relating to heavy consumption of alcohol. This was the main problem after the drinking age was raised to 21, even thought the population overall did not consume as much alcohol, when they did consume, they would not drink responsibly and therefore end in tragic poisoning and sometimes intoxication. Also, in the late 1980 s after the law for 21 was passed, the number of people who reported puking after drinking had a dramatic rise (Rogers 24).

This is mainly due to three factors: the raise in the drinking age, the consideration of alcohol as a forbidden fruit, and the poor education concerning alcohol given to students. For most adolescents, it is a common trait to try to be older than what he or she really is. If a young person is sixteen years old he will try to apparent being 18 years of age, and if he is 18, he will try to be 20, and so on. This is due to simple psychological composition and peer pressure or supremacy. For this reason, if an adult is allowed to drink and a young person is not, the young adolescent will try to do anything possible to get this privilege. Alcohol, which is in reach of an adult but not of an adolescent who is in fact mentally mature to drink, alcohol will be considered a forbidden fruit (Eng's 2).

Because this is illegal and forbidden the adolescent will go through the trouble of committing a crime such as carrying a false identification system to be able to reach this stage of presumed adulthood. When the purpose is reached the person will be able to drink but without having the proper education for it, resulting in terrible and regrettable consequences such as alcohol poisoning or intoxication. Therefore, the theory of forbidden fruit must be eliminated by declaring alcohol purchase minimum for all ages above the average maturity level, as well, providing good education to eliminate the possibilities of abuse and poisoning. Education for young adolescents as to the harms of alcohol is one of the most important contributions a government can make to society. Education, along with the perfect drinking age, can provide a country with the lowest attainable consumption of alcohol. As mentioned earlier, alcohol consumption will never be abolished but can only be reduced.

Drinking has for thousands of years formed part of society and it will not cease to do so from one day to another. What must be done is simply to make sure that alcohol is treated with respect. One of the main causes of irresponsible drinking in the United States is the poor quality of alcohol education. In high schools across the United States, the students are taught drink responsibly but then again, they are taught not to drink at all because it is illegal. Therefore, because it seems like something out of reach for them, they do not pay attention to the education.

When the time to drink comes, they do not enforce what they have been taught and it results in irresponsible drinking. The important thing is not to use this type of education being presently used where alcohol is regarded as a restriction but to change it in to something that is in reach but which is regarded as a privilege and therefore should be handled with respect. When this type of education is imposed, teenagers will still drink but they will not drink in abuse. Teenagers will treat alcohol as what it is, something harmful when used in excess.

This is the main problem with a drinking age of 21, because the drink is a forbidden fruit and the availability of a drink is not constant, when there is a chance to get a drink, the opportunity is taken as an advantage by a teenager and drinks are abused. The teenager will try to drink as much a possible because the opportunity may not be seen for a long term. This creates into an abuse of alcohol which imposes serious danger. This difference can be witnessed when alcohol consumption of the United States and countries in Europe where the drinking age is 18 are studied. In Europe, more people drink and more alcohol is consumed, but in the United States there is a higher concentration of alcoholism and alcohol abuse. Obviously, it is better for a country to have less alcoholism even though alcohol consumption may be higher.

Therefore, the key factor in this is having a low drinking age such as 18 but at the same time having a good education be provided to young drinkers. What governments need to enforce is a type of education where a teenager has the ability to drink but for them to regard alcohol drinking simply as a an event they can enjoy sociably without a need to abuse it. The only way to successfully prove what has been mentioned above is to actually research what is happening with society and its relation to alcohol. This can be done very easily with use of surveys. Even though it is very hard to survey every single person in the world, a survey can be given to a smaller group of people and the results of this survey should be able to predict the same pattern for the larger group.

In this case, a survey was handed out to a total of one hundred and twenty people. Because of the difference in the people being surveyed however, it was important to maintain a clear balance between the groups. In this case, the survey was divided into two groups, those from a country with a drinking age of 21 and those from a country with a drinking age of 18. These two groups were divided into two more groups, those overage and those underage. Due to the limit of people found from countries with drinking age 18 however, only 18 surveys could be analyzed for each of the four groups. Therefore, a total of 72 surveys were analyzed from which very effective results were obtained.

The results of the survey were very favorable, they allowed for go...


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Research essay sample on Age Of 21 18 Years Of Age

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