Although selling alcohol to minors is illegal, a recent study found that one in every nine elementary school students had purchased alcohol, researchers said on Sunday.
It was also found that students who did not taken part in after-school tutorials, who came from single-parent families or who did not live with their parents were more likely to do so.
The findings were published by researchers from the Institute of Population Health Sciences under the National Health Research -Institutes in the April 1 edition of the international journal Drug and Alcohol Dependence.
ALCOHOL PURCHASES
The study showed that one out of every nine students aged 10 to 12 had bought alcohol, while 36 percent had drunk alcohol, one of the researchers Chen Chuan-yu (陳娟瑜) said.
Among students who had drunk alcohol, those with educational institutions near their schools were less likely to buy it themselves, the study found.
However, children who did not live with their parents, were from single-parent families, or who had observed their parents drinking alcohol, were two to three times more likely to buy alcohol.
Chen said that young people usually drink alcohol at social events such as gatherings of family and friends or because of easy access in general and convenience stores,
“Inexpensive alcoholic beverages are available everywhere,” Chen said.
According to the Food and Drug Administration, the average age of those drinking alcohol has fallen in recent years.
UNDERAGE DRINKING
The survey showed that 40 percent of minors had drunk alcohol before the legal age of 18 and one out of every four or five first tried alcohol before the age of 12.
The top cause of death and injury among young people is traffic accidents under the influence of alcohol, the survey found.
The researchers collected 1,306 samples from fourth-graders and 1,324 samples from sixth-graders.
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